Cadaver dogs of Kerala Police to join Telangana tunnel collapse rescue operation

As rescue operations at the partially collapsed SLBC tunnel in Telangana continue for the 13th day to extricate eight trapped men, cadaver dogs will be joining the teams in their efforts, officials said on Thursday. A Kerala government statement in Thiruvananthapuram said the cadaver dogs of the state police will be joining the rescue operations in Telangana's Nagarkurnool.

Cadaver dogs are specially trained to locate missing humans and human bodies. The canines and the officers handling them left for Hyderabad on Thursday morning, it said. The dogs were sent for the rescue operation following a request by the State Disaster Management Authority whose help in the matter was sought by the National Disaster Management Authority, the statement said.

Eight persons -- engineers and labourers -- have been trapped in the Srisailam Left Bank Canal (SLBC) project tunnel in Telangana since February 22 and experts from the NDRF, Indian Army, Navy and other agencies are making relentless efforts to pull them out to safety. Meanwhile, a senior Telangana police official told PTI that two specially trained dogs, brought from Kerala, will be taken inside the tunnel on Thursday.