Deluge-Battered Himachal: Helpless In Face Of Nature’s Fury, But Warriors At Heart

Shimla
They are helpless in the face of nature’s fury, but true warriors to save the life of others. Scores of government functionaries are on toes and risking their lives for over a week now to bring back the deluge-battered Himachal Pradesh to normalcy. The frontline departments comprise the police, the state disaster response force, the electricity, the irrigation and public health and the public works. One of the toughest operations was carried out at the Chandertal lake, located at an altitude of over 14,000 feet, in the snow-marooned Spiti Valley, by the police in coordination with the Indian Air Force (IAF) and the Border Roads Organisation (BRO). A total of 290 tourists had been stranded in the Chandertal since July 8 owing to torrential rains that triggered landslides and snapped most of the road links in the Lahaul-Spiti district, state’s cold desert where a sudden drop in the temperature, even in summer, can trigger winter-like conditions.
The police team risked their lives to ensure that critical patients were airlifted on time. Finally, all tourists, including foreigners and local shepherds, were evacuated on July 13 by road after clearing dumps of snow from a mountain pass. A video shared by the state police on Monday showed a clipping of evacuation of seven tourists, who were in need of medical emergency, from the Chandertal in Barashingri Glacier at elevation of 4.3 km by IAF’s Mi-17 V5, considered to be one of the world’s most modern transport helicopters. Due to treacherous terrain, no communication with ground, no wind indication and no place to land, the pickup zone was extremely challenging for any kind of landing or winching operations, says the IAF.