[Anchor]

Ground searches by the rapid response team have officially intensified to find the nine South Korean nationals missing in the heavy floods in Nepal. Our overseas emergency relief team has also arrived in Nepal and is joining the operations on-site.

Reporter Gwak Sang-eun has the details.

[Reporter]

Our rapid response team focused its search around the water intake weir dam upstream of the river, where the missing South Koreans are presumed to be located.

This is an area with a high likelihood of local staff, including one South Korean, being present.

Drones were deployed multiple times to observe the gorges around the dam.

[It's going down really far, right? We're at an altitude of 2,000 meters right now.]

Starting yesterday morning, full-scale overland searches were also conducted with the assistance of the Nepalese military.

[Jeon Gi-baek / Head of Government Joint Rapid Response Team: The drones had a quite meaningful effect yesterday, so we are heading down to check that out as well.]

However, searches have not yet been conducted around the office building across from the power house, a downstream power generation facility where the other eight missing South Koreans are believed to have been at the time of the accident.

The search is gradually expanding, starting from areas with the highest probability of finding missing persons, but no news regarding the missing individuals has been reported yet.

Korea South-East Power Co. and Doosan Enerbility are also joining the search efforts.

Meanwhile, a 44-member Korea Disaster Relief Team, formed upon the official request of the Nepalese government, arrived in Nepal this morning (September 2).

The team consists of 3 members from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 from the Korea International Cooperation Agency, and 37 from the National Fire Agency. They are equipped with various advanced tools, including 5 rescue dogs, high-resolution unmanned aerial vehicles, acoustic and video detectors for buried victims, and thermal imaging cameras.

They plan to cooperate with Nepalese authorities to conduct search and rescue operations for the victims. The scheduled duration of their activities is about ten days, but it may be extended depending on conditions on the ground.

(Video by Joo Yong-jin and Han Gyeol | Video Editing by Cho Moo-hwan)