Siachen avalanche: Rescuers retrieve bodies of remaining eight soldiers

Jammu: Bodies of all the eight remaining soldiers were on Tuesday recovered from the huge mass of ice on Siachen Glacier, seven days after they got buried under an avalanche that hit their high altitude military post.[caption id=“attachment_2618922” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Indian Army soldiers who lost their lives during a deadly avalanche in Siachen Glacier. Image courtesy Indian Army
[/caption] One body was recovered on Tuesday while one soldier was miraculously found alive. “All the remaining eight bodies of soldiers have been recovered from the avalanche site,” a senior Army officer said in New Delhi. “They were traced in the operation which were launched at Siachen to locate and retrieve the 10 soldiers buried under more than 30 feet of snow and ice after an avalanche struck their Post in the early hours of February 3,” he said. “It is to the credit and dogged determination of the rescue teams which were working under extreme conditions that they have managed to extricate Lance Naik Hanamanthappa Koppad alive from under more than 30 feet of snow,” he said. “It is with deep regret that we wish to confirm that mortal remains of balance of nine martyrs including a Junior Commissioned Officer were also retrieved by the rescue teams,” he said. The mortal remains, after due formalities, will be flown to their home towns as soon as possible, the officer said. The deceased soldiers including Subedar Nagesha TT of village Tejur, Hassan District, Karnataka, Havildar Elumalai M of village Dukkam Parai, Vellore District, Tamil Nadu, Lance Havildar S Kumar of village Kumanan Thozhu, Teni District, Tamil Nadu, Lance Naik Sudheesh of village Monroethuruth, Kollam District, Kerala and Sepoy Mahesha PN of village HD Kote, Mysore District, Karnataka. Sepoy Ganesan of village Chokkathevan Patti, Madurai District, Tamil Nadu, Sepoy Rama Moorthy of village  Gudisatana Palli, Krishna Giri District, Tamil Nadu, Sepoy Mustaq Ahmed of village Parnapalle, Kurnool District, Andhra Pradesh and Sepoy Nursing Assistant Suryawanshi of village Maskarwadi, Satara District, Maharashtra were also among the dead. PTI