{"id":8033,"date":"2026-07-22T20:35:22","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T20:35:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/death-toll-from-blast-at-indian-hydroelectric-project-rises-to-20-people\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T20:35:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T20:35:22","slug":"death-toll-from-blast-at-indian-hydroelectric-project-rises-to-20-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/death-toll-from-blast-at-indian-hydroelectric-project-rises-to-20-people\/","title":{"rendered":"Death toll from blast at Indian hydroelectric project rises to 20 people"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p><em>Rescuers say flooding and toxic gas in the collapsed tunnel make it unlikely any remaining trapped workers survived.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div aria-live=\"polite\" aria-atomic=\"true\">\n<p>The death toll from a gas explosion that caused a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2026\/7\/21\/india-tunnel-collapse-at-a-hydropower-project-kills-10-as-17-remain-missing\">tunnel to collapse<\/a> at a hydroelectric project under construction in the remote northeastern Indian state of Sikkim has risen to at least 20 people.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOut of the 25 who were trapped, 13 bodies have been recovered so far,\u201d said Rajiv Roka, director of the Sikkim State Disaster Management Authority. \u201cThe rescuers have also seen seven to eight more bodies inside, but they have not been able to retrieve them so far.\u201d<\/p>\n<section>\n<h2>Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n<p><span>list of 3 items<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span>list 1 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2025\/11\/5\/at-least-11-killed-as-passenger-train-collides-with-cargo-train-in-india\">At least 11 killed as passenger train collides with cargo train in India<\/a><\/li>\n<li><span>list 2 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2026\/5\/14\/duststorms-and-lightning-kill-at-least-96-people-in-northern-india\">Duststorms and lightning kill at least 96 people in northern India<\/a><\/li>\n<li><span>list 3 of 3<\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2026\/7\/20\/at-least-25-killed-as-floods-and-landslides-hit-northern-india\">At least 25 killed as floods and landslides hit northern India<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n<p>Rescue efforts at the 500-megawatt project for the state-owned National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) were hampered because the tunnel was waterlogged and methane gas was leaking from the underground rock formations.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was a collection of water \u2026 so it\u2019s been difficult to retrieve the bodies,\u201d Roka said. \u201cLooking at the condition, I don\u2019t think there could be any survivors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The region has seen torrential monsoon rains in recent days, complicating recovery work.<\/p>\n<p>The NHPC, which is overseeing the hydroelectric project, said in a statement the tunnel\u2019s collapse was triggered by an \u201cexplosive release of suspected methane gas trapped\/embedded in the rocks, resulting in the generation of dense smoke and toxic gases\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It said a detailed investigation would be conducted.<\/p>\n<p>Accidents at large infrastructure sites are common in India, but environmental experts say a surge in development projects has triggered more disasters in the ecologically fragile Himalayan region, where seismic activity and unstable rock formations make tunnelling especially risky.<\/p>\n<p>In 2023, 41 workers were rescued after being trapped for 17 days when a Himalayan road tunnel collapsed in the northern state of Uttarakhand.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rescuers say flooding and toxic gas in the collapsed tunnel make it unlikely any remaining trapped workers survived. The death toll from a gas explosion that caused a\u00a0tunnel to collapse at a hydroelectric project under construction in the remote northeastern Indian state of Sikkim has risen to at least 20 people. \u201cOut of the 25 &#8230; <a title=\"Death toll from blast at Indian hydroelectric project rises to 20 people\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/death-toll-from-blast-at-indian-hydroelectric-project-rises-to-20-people\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Death toll from blast at Indian hydroelectric project rises to 20 people\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8034,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}