Search for boys missing in flooded cave in Thailand continues | World news

Attempts to find 12 boys and their football coach missing in a flooded cave complex in northern Thailand for nearly two days have failed, but officials said they believed they were still alive.

The boys, aged 11-15, are understood to have entered the Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Chiang Rai province with their coach late on Saturday afternoon. A mother reported her son had not returned from football practice that day, prompting the search.

“We are still searching right now,” Chote Narin, an officer at Mae Sai district police station, said on Monday. “We’ve found traces but no people yet.”

He said footprints and handprints were found inside the cave complex and officials believed the boys were still alive. He said the fact that they were athletes should help them endure the situation.

Navy Seal divers were trying to reach a chamber deep inside the cave complex where officials thought the students might be. The chamber is about 2.5 miles (4km) from the entrance of the cave, which is thought to be about four to five miles (6-8km) long.

Kamolchai Kotcha, an official at the forest park where the cave is located, said on Monday that attempts to reach the chamber had failed as the passage was extremely small, “flooded and covered with sand and mud”.

“Right now, our family is hoping that the children trapped inside will have formed a group and are safe and waiting for officials to go in and save them in time,” Noppadol Kantawong, the father of one of the missing boys, told Thai PBS on Sunday.

Footage on Thai television showed bicycles, backpacks and football boots left outside the entrance to the cave, with soldiers and rescue personnel in attendance.

The cave is a tourist attraction but can flood during Thailand’s rainy season, which runs from June to October.

According to Kamolchai, tourists trapped in the cave by past floods have been rescued after the water receded a few days later.