SYDNEY, Jan 10: An Indian soldier was missing and believed dead following a rafting accident in southern Australia, officials said on Saturday.

The 23-year-old was on an army rafting trip in a rugged area of the Franklin River on Friday when he was pulled into surging rapids and went under.

“A soldier from the Indian army is believed dead, but it’s not confirmed, as a result of an accident during a rafting expedition,” a defence spokeswoman said.

He was one of five Indian officers on a joint training exercise with the Australian army, she said, and was rafting with 10 local soldiers when he was sucked into wild waters on the Franklin, on the southern island state of Tasmania.

An immediate search was launched but police failed to find any sign of the man by nightfall.

Rescue crews resumed the search early on Saturday, but police said there appeared little hope of finding the soldier alive.

“It is now reported to us that the Indian man was seen to fall whilst trying to get ashore at a portage around a rapid,” Inspector Brian Edmonds told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

“The man was seen to enter the water but not resurface below the rapid.

That leads us to the conclusion that potentially drowning is a real likelihood.” A helicopter, kayak and ground search was under way, with a 10-man team combing the riverbank, assisted by soldiers from the trip. The waters were too rough for divers to search below the surface, he said.

Dubbed “The Cauldron”, the rapids are a famously dangerous section of the Franklin, featuring large boulders and speeding waters. An Australian man died there in 1985.—AFP