Tuesday, February 15 2005 13:32 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Jammu: Around 40 soldiers had a narrow escape when a fresh avalanche struck the Jawahar tunnel linking the Kashmir valley with the rest of the country and blocked its southern tube on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway, official sources said today (Feb 15, 2005).

Jawans from the Army, Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Indian Reserve Police, who were engaged in rescue operations, had a narrow escape when two fresh avalanches hit the Jawahar tunnel last evening (Feb 14, 2005), the sources said.

Due to the avalanche, the southern 2.5 km portion of the Jawahar tunnel has been blocked and only one tunnel is operational at present, they said.

The Snow Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE) has warned of more avalanches in the future and also sounded a red alert in avalanche-prone zones along the highway, they said.

To clear the snow, the Army has triggered several blasts to create artificial avalanches since the last two days but these have been unsuccessful, they said.

Meanwhile, the Jammu-Srinagar national highway was open for one-way traffic despite fresh snowfall this morning, the sources said.

"The highway is open for one-way traffic and vehicles have been allowed from Srinagar to Jammu today. But heavy snowfall is on since this morning with fresh threat of closure of the highway", they said.

Over 400 vehicles were allowed to move towards Jammu today from Srinagar, they said adding that over 3,000 vehicles crossed towards Kashmir valley yesterday after eight days of the closure of the JK highway, they said.