India, Nov. 28 -- As the rescue operations entered the 17th day in the Silkyara tunnel, micro tunnelling expert Chris Cooper on Tuesday said three metres of manual drilling has been done so far and about 50 metres of drilling work has been completed in total.

"It went very well last night. We have crossed 50 metres. It's now about five-six metres to go. We didn't have any obstacles last night. It is looking very positive," news agency quoted Cooper as saying.

ANI citing official sources reported that about 57 metres of drilling work from the mouth of the tunnel, is to be done in total to lay a pipe inside the tunnel to reach the trapped workers.

Earlier the rescuers had completed about 47 metres of drilling work using the auger machine...