CHTIRAL: The Chitral police rescued 25 people, including women and children, on Thursday when snow avalanches left them stranded near the Chitral portal of Lowari Tunnel.
Zahid Ali of Mulkhow said that snow avalanches fell from the hillock when his vehicle, which was part of the convoy of eight automobiles, was heading towards the tunnel.
He however said the avalanches didn’t hit the vehicle bound for Peshawar from Chitral carried four other members of his family.
“The passengers of a vehicle left behind to change a punctured tyre informed the nearest police checkpost in Ashirait about the incident. A police team led by sub-divisional police officer of Drosh Zafar Ahmad rushed to the place and rescued stranded people to a safe place from where they later returned,” he said.
The passenger said the police team also narrowly escaped an avalanche.
“Had there been any delay in our rescue, things would have been disastrous,” he said.
When contacted, SDPO Zafar Ahmad said he knew an avalanche was followed by more and therefore, he wasted no time in responding to the incident and managed to rescue the stranded passengers.
He said the district police officer had ordered the deployment of 60 police commandos on the tunnel’s approach road to carry out rescue operations.
The SDPO said 50 personnel of traffic police had been deployed at different points to regulate vehicular traffic on the way to Lowari Tunnel on Fridays and Tuesdays.–Dawn
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