At least four construction workers killed in avalanche in northern India

At least four workers have died after an avalanche swept away a large construction crew working on a road near India’s mountainous border with Tibet, the army said.

The incident happened near the Mana Pass in northern Uttarakhand state on Friday, and 55 construction workers were initially trapped under snow.

Rescuers pulled out 50 workers, of whom four later died, the army said in a statement on Saturday.

It said the search for five missing workers is continuing, with multiple teams of rescuers and military helicopters scanning the site.

The statement did not specify the number of injured but said they were “being prioritised for evacuation”.

Chandrashekhar Vashistha, a senior administrative official, said some of the workers had sustained serious injures and were in hospital.

Many of the trapped workers were migrant labourers working on a highway widening and resurfacing project along a 30-mile stretch from Mana, the last village on the Indian side, to the Mana Pass bordering Tibet.

“Rescue operations were slow due to heavy snowfall, and the area remained inaccessible,” said Kamlesh Kamal, a spokesman for the Indo-Tibetan Border Police.

He said the rescuers had to work through several feet of snow, snowstorms and poor visibility.

The ecologically sensitive Himalayan region, which has been severely affected by global warming, is prone to avalanches and flash floods.

In 2022, 27 trainee mountaineers were killed in an avalanche in northern Uttarakhand. A year earlier, a glacier burst in the state resulting in a flash flood that left more than 200 people dead.