Pakistan cable car incident: Rescue under way for eight people trapped

The group were on their way to school when one of the cables snapped, leaving it hanging 274m (900 ft) above ground, officials said.

Pakistan's acting PM has ordered rescuers to attend to the "alarming" incident in Battagram.

Army helicopters have reached the car but the rescue's status is unclear.

The eight passengers were trapped for at least four hours before the first helicopter arrived, local media outlet Dawn.com reported.

The incident happened at about 07:00 local time (02:00 GMT) on Tuesday across the Allai valley in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Residents spotting the car stranded mid-air had used loudspeakers to alert local officials of the mishap.

The open chair-lift is now being "suspended by a single rope", local rescue official Abdul Basit Khan told AFP news agency.

"For God's sake help us," Gulfraz, a man stuck in the cable car, told Pakistan television channel Geo News by phone. He confirmed eight people were on board.

One of the students had fallen unconscious in the past three hours, he said, adding that students on board were aged between 10 and 15 years old.

He noted that anxious crowds had gathered on either side of the valley to watch the mission. Authorities are trying to spread nets underneath the car.

"People in our area are standing here and crying," Gulfaraz said, urging authorities to send immediate help.

Even with helicopters on site, the rescue is proving complicated due to gusty winds and concerns that the helicopter's rotor blades could further destabilise the chair lift, a rescue official at the site told Reuters.

One helicopter has already come back from a surveillance trip while another would be sent shortly, he added.

Headmaster Ali Asghar Khan told AFP by phone that the children trapped are students of his government high school Battangi Pashto.

A local teacher told Dawn.com that about 150 people take the hazardous journey to school by cable car daily because of a lack of transport options in the area.

Cable cars are common connectors for residents to get between villages in the remote, mountainous regions in Pakistan's north. This one is believed to be privately operated by residents, local media reported.

Pakistan's acting prime minister Anwaar ul Haq Kakar said on X (formerly Twitter) that he has directed the relevant authorities to inspect all such privately-operated chairlifts to ensure that they are safe for use.

"The chairlift accident in Battagram is really alarming," he said.

-bbc