india

Updated: Feb 21, 2019 23:29 IST

A joint team of Army and Indo-Tibetan -Border Police is on standby to restart the operation to search for remaining five Army jawans who were trapped in the snow avalanche in Himachal Pradesh’s Kinnaur district, officials said on Thursday.

Six jawans of the 7 JAK Rifles of the Army unit — four from Himachal Pradesh, one each from Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir — were trapped in the avalanche that occurred near Shipki La border outpost on Wednesday. One of them identified as havaldar Rakesh Kumar was rescued but succumbed to injuries . The search and rescue operation has been adversely affected as Pooh witnessed 4 to 5 inches of snowfall even as more snowfall occurred at Shipki La and adjoining areas on Wednesday night, the officials said, adding it has been raining heavily at the spot since morning.

“Army launched an operation early on Thursday to rescue those buried under the snow, but the inclement weather conditions hampered the operation,” deputy commissioner Kinnaur Gopal Chand said.

The ITBP patrolling party had tried to alert army men fixing water pipes near Namgia Dogri post when they were hit by the avalanche.