Rising water levels have interrupted efforts to find 12 teenagers and their football coach trapped in a cave in northern Thailand.
Rescue personnel at the opening of the Tham Luang cave in Khun Nam Nang Non Forest Park. Photo: AFP
Pumping was halted and with the entrance flooded, Thai navy divers had to stop their search.
The boys, aged 11 to 16, and their 25-year-old coach entered the cave on Saturday and there has been no contact with them since.
It was not known where in the cave the group were trapped, nor even whether they were still alive.
As search efforts entered the fifth day, Interior Minister Anupong Paojinda said officials were "confident the children are still alive".
"They have food, they are skilful, we are confident they are safe."
Thai authorities said they planned to drill a narrow shaft into the mountain to create an alternative entry point, as the rescue operation shifted focus to finding another way into the cave.
Messages the children sent before setting off to explore the cave on Saturday suggested they had taken torches and some food.
Caving experts told the BBC that as long as they were in a chamber above flood levels, they had a chance of survival. The biggest dangers would be hypothermia or lack of oxygen.
The cave, Tham Luang, is Thailand's fourth-longest and known to be prone to flooding during the rainy season.
The teenagers and coach were believed to have been cut off from the entrance by rising floodwaters.
Rescue teams and volunteers frantically tried to find a way into the cave in the past few days, scouring the surrounding area for holes, but failed to get through.
On Wednesday, three British cave divers arrived in the city of Chiang Rai along with some US military personnel, to help the efforts. They are expected to go into the cave once the main entrance is accessible again.
"Water is the biggest challenge," Sgt Kresada Wanaphum in the Thai army told Reuters.
"There is a lot of debris and sand that gets stuck while pumping."
British caver Vern Unsworth, who is based in Chiang Rai, told Reuters there were "massive amounts" of water seeping into the cave.
"There is a watershed inside, which is unusual. It means there is water coming in from two directions," he said.
- BBC
