By Gopal Sharma
KATHMANDU, Sept 4 (Reuters) – When the mountain gave way above the Nepali power plant where Sanjay Sah worked, he had a choice: flee, or stay. He chose to stay and help.
The mechanical foreman was rescued on Friday alongside another worker, nine days after a wall of ice, rock and debris levelled the valley where the Upper Trishuli 3A Hydropower Station was located, providing a rare glimmer of hope in search operations for thousands missing after the unprecedented disaster.
“I was in the control room in the tunnel. Normally there are four to six people there, but there could have been 40 to 45 people that day,” the 30-year-old told army officials from a stretcher, an oxygen mask strapped to his face, in a video shared by the Nepali authorities.
“My responsibility was to save everyone’s lives. When there was such a big accident, it was not right for me to run away.”
Sah said he had warned the others the moment word came of the disaster upstream, urging them to flee. He never made it out himself. By the time he turned to run, there was no time left.
Officials believe at least 900 people are trapped in tunnels related to six hydropower projects along the Trishuli river.
For nine days, Sah sat in the tunnel’s darkness, where he chanted mantras (verses from a prayer) to hold onto hope. He managed to stay in contact with three or four other workers somewhere in the tunnel and said others could be trapped deeper into the mountain.
Sah and fellow survivor Kabir Maharjan, a mechanical supervisor, are the first workers to be rescued from the hydropower projects. A small group had managed to escape from another tunnel hours after the disaster struck.
Footage released by the Nepali Army showed Sah being carried out on a worker’s back, his face caked in mud.
At least 1,287 people were killed in Nepal as houses, streets and schools in towns and villages near the border with China’s Tibet were swept away. So far 5,083 people are reported missing and thousands more displaced. China has put the death toll in Tibet at 21, with 541 others listed as missing.
Sah and Maharjan have been taken to an army hospital in Kathmandu, where they remain in intensive care.
(Reporting by Gopal Sharma in Kathmandu; Writing by Aftab Ahmed; Editing by Saad Sayeed)
