(UnitedHeadlines.com) – On May 28, heavy rains caused the collapse of a stone quarry in Melthum, India, killing 17 workers, with another 12 quarry workers still missing.
Rescue workers battled heavy rains, using heavy equipment to cut through the stone slabs as they attempted to locate survivors. The state’s chief minister noted that the “continuous flow of soil and mud” has made rescue efforts “more difficult.”
According to senior police officer Rahul Alwal, two workers have been rescued from the debris as rescue teams continue digging through the collapsed quarry to search for more survivors. Rescuers have also recovered the bodies of the 17 workers killed in the collapse.
The heavy rainfall in India’s northeastern states comes as tropical storm Remal, the first storm of the season, made landfall on May 26 in Bangladesh. The heavy rains prompted India’s Meteorological Department to issue warnings that the rains could cause damage to thatched houses and vulnerable structures and that the rains could cause landslides in the region.
At least six people were killed in separate landslides that were caused by the heavy rains in the state of Melthum, according to Alwal. The landslides left the state capital cut off from the rest of the country, according to officials. Sixteen people have been killed across the region due to the tropical storm, including three people in the state of Assam and two people in the states of Meghalaya and Nagaland.
Melthum, in the state of Mizoram, is located less than 4 miles from the state capital of Aizwal. The state of Mizoram has many stone quarries that mine raw materials used in the construction of buildings and roads. However, many companies that operate quarries in the area do not have the required environmental clearance to extract stones.
Seven workers were killed in 2023 in a quarry collapse in the state’s Mamit town, while a similar collapse in 2022 killed 12 workers.
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