Survivors Found in Nepal as Search Intensifies for Missing South Koreans

[Anchor]

There is still no news regarding our nine citizens, but we must not let go of hope until the very end. Let us connect to Nepal to check on the local search efforts.

Reporter Kwon Min-kyu, a survivor was found not too far away. What was the atmosphere like on the ground?

[Reporter]

Even today (Sept. 4), helicopters were flying back and forth incessantly here at the Vatar military base for the search and rescue of the missing.

Around 10:00 a.m. local time, a man wearing an oxygen respirator was rescued by helicopter and transferred to a medical facility inside the military base.

The Nepalese Minister of Home Affairs was also spotted coming directly to the military base to direct the search and boarding a helicopter to move to the scene.

[Anchor]

We hope to hear miraculous rescue news on our side as well. What is the search status of our disaster relief team?

[Reporter]

Our government's emergency relief team, which began full-scale operations yesterday, continued their search today in cooperation with the Nepalese military authorities.

[Lee Kyu-ho / Head of the South Korean Emergency Relief Team: We landed closest to the accident area at the weir dam, checked two tunnels there, and launched drones afterwards. We landed in the powerhouse area, took photos of everything there...]

Today is the first time the government's emergency relief team traveled to the site by helicopter.

An attempt was made yesterday as well, but thick fog in the search area forced the helicopter to turn back after 30 minutes.

Launching helicopters twice at 8:30 a.m. and 9:00 a.m. today, the relief team intensively examined the ridge behind the main camp in the Ramche area—where eight South Koreans went missing—and the area under the bridge connecting the camp to the powerhouse.

In the Dunche area near the weir dam, where one missing South Korean is presumed to be, two relief team members remained to search on foot while heading down.

The commander of the Vatar military base reportedly told the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that the Nepalese military had already conducted precise searches five or six times in the Ramche area, asking if they could not trust the Nepalese military; however, our relief team stated that they persuaded them that additional searching was necessary.

(Video by: Seol Chi-hwan, Kang Si-woo | Video Editing by: Lee Sang-min)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.