Nine tourists including a 7 year old child were rescued on 19th of January after they became trapped in the deep snow in the region of Veliko Turnovo, Northern Bulgaria. The rescue operation went on for 2 days. It involved 25 firefighters, police,...
Nine tourists including a 7 year old child were rescued on 19th of January after they became trapped in the deep snow in the region of Veliko Turnovo, Northern Bulgaria.
The rescue operation went on for 2 days. It involved 25 firefighters, police, disaster management teams from the Civil Protection unit and specialized equipment. The people were rescued with ATV, but their cars remained stuck in the snow.
The group of tourists went to the village of Raikovtsi to spend the weekend, but the snowdrifts in the area reached heights of up to 1 m and the strong wind piled up snow on the narrow forest road. On Sunday, 17th of January, the group set off for home, but the cars got stuck in the snow. Fortunately, they managed to walk back to the huts and called the emergency phone number, 112. They remained trapped in the huts for 3 days, had no electricity, but sufficient food and water.
To make the roads passable, the rescue teams used excavators to remove the snow.
7 villages in the region are still without electricity after the intense snow fall during the weekend. There are no stranded villages. Roads are passable in winter conditions.