Charlie Smith
A NEW, more powerful drilling machine has been scrambled from work on a Madrid motorway to join the rescue efforts of those trying to save little Julen.
The 75-tonne 70-metre drill was taken from working on the capital’s M-40 highway to Totalan where the child is stuck in the ground.
The two-year-old fell into the 107-metre well on Sunday in Totalan and engineers have been working around the clock to save him.
Presumed still alive, the efforts to save the Malaga tot, who has spent over 100 hours trapped, now focus on two tunnels.
A horizontal tunnel was abandoned amid fears of unstable ground at the 20cm-wide borehole and instead two vertical shafts will be drilled in case one of them collapses.
Rescue efforts are made more complicated this weekend by rain forecasts predicted across Andalucia.
It comes after rescue teams used a geolocator to determine that there is a cavity below the blockage currently trapping the Spanish tot in the well at around 73m deep.
This boosted hopes of the youngster’s survival and the engineers now think that they can reach him by Monday.
“It’s as if Julen were the son of everyone,” said Ángel García Vidal , delegate of the Association of Civil Engineers in Málaga.
His words reflect the worldwide captivation of Julen’s story, as the media in all corners of the globe await his rescue.
