VIENTIANE: Four more men trapped in a semi-submerged Laos cave for 10 days were freed on Saturday, rescuers said, after one was successfully brought to the surface a day earlier, but two remained missing.
Lee Kian Lie, a Malaysian rescue diver, said via Messenger that the four were freed after water was pumped out of the cavern. A video he took from the scene showed teams under a makeshift tent attending to four people lying on stretchers and covered with thermal blankets.
“Important they already out,” Lee said. He declined to speculate on the condition of the two who remained unaccounted for. The Thailand Rescue Diver Facebook page said in a post that “rescue officials were able to bring out four more people trapped” at about 3:10pm (0810 GMT) on Saturday.
“A total of five people have now been rescued, while two remain missing,” it said. Seven men had been trapped in the cavern in a remote mountainous area of central Xaysomboun province since May 20, when flash floods stranded them as they searched for gold, early state media reports said. They were trapped after heavy rains triggered flash flooding that blocked the exit of the cavern.
Five of the men were located alive on Wednesday, huddling in a narrow shaft around 300 metres (984 feet) from the cave mouth. Rescuers guided a bedraggled and muddy man over unsteady ground to safety on Friday.
Rescue efforts had focused on pumping out the monsoon flood waters that trapped the men. Rescuers had expressed optimism earlier on Saturday about their chances of freeing the four.
Published in Dawn, May 31st, 2026
