VIENTIAN (AFP): Rescuers searching for two men missing in a partially flooded cave in Laos for about two weeks said they were scouring for a new entry point on Monday as heavy rain slowed divers' efforts inside.
Rescue divers found five other men alive around 300 metres (984 feet) from the mouth of the cave in Xaysomboun province last week after they had been stranded inside by flash floods for a week.
Foreign divers extracted one of the men on Friday, and four more found their own way out on Saturday. Rescue teams had delivered food and medicine for them and had pumped water from the cave for days, giving them an easier exit.
One of the five survivors, identified as Laen, said in a video released by state media on Monday the men had gone into the cave to hunt bats for food and then figured they could extract some gold from old mining areas.
"But then rain came and the cave was flooded," Laen says in the video.
"We went to look for food and thought that if we could make money as well, then why not? That's the way we all live in the village."
Earlier state media reports said the seven men had entered the cave to search for gold.
The two missing men are believed to have gone deeper inside, leaving rescuers scrambling to find an alternative access route after recent rainfall made conditions in the cave more risky.
- 'Too unstable' -
Malaysian diver Lee Kian Lie told AFP on Monday that one team was still searching inside the cave and clearing a path after rain inundated the tunnels.
A second team "will search possible entry from the other side into the cave chamber" where rescuers suspect the last two men are stuck, he said in a message.
Rain made some of the passages "too unstable", so the search priority "has shifted to some promising leads above the cave" that might link to a chamber where the two men took shelter, Finnish diver Mikko Paasi said on social media.
"We as a dive team will assist the local climbers and stand by in case they find water and our expertise is needed again," added Paasi, who took part in the dramatic 2018 rescue of a youth football team from a flooded cave in Thailand.
Thai rescuer Kengkard Bonggawong said teams were also using satellite radar to look for tunnels that could lead them to the missing men.
"We are racing to pump water out and making an air line into the cave for breathing," Kengkard said in a video posted to social media.
Japanese diver Yoshitaka Isaji said teams had found another potential way into the cave through "a crack" in the mountain.
"The space may continue after a descent of approximately 100 metres using a rope," he wrote in a Facebook post. "We will continue to search the crack."
Another Thai rescuer, Manat Artmongkron, posted that a team heard responding "knocking sounds" in a chamber after rappelling to a depth of 70 metres, which he called "good news". -- AFP
