Divers who helped in the dramatic rescue of a young Thai football team in 2018 have joined efforts to free seven people who have been trapped for five days inside a remote, flooded cave in central Laos.

The group entered the cave in Xaysomboun province on Wednesday to hunt for wildlife and search for gold, reports suggest. Heavy rain led to landslides, which blocked the cave entrance.

Laos’s communist government, which tightly controls the country’s media, could not be reached for comment.

Footage released by Thai volunteer rescue groups who have travelled to the site showed personnel crawling and climbing through dark, narrow passageways, parts of which were almost completely inundated with muddy waters. Rescuers said a tunnel leading into the cave was only 60cm tall.

Experts outside the cave were focused on pumping water out of the passageways, while those inside were fitting rope for rescuers to follow, said Kengkard Bongkawong, the head of operations for Metta Tham Rescue, a Thai rescue group.

“The route is not complicated but the problem is the space. It’s so narrow that we have to crawl and tilt to pass through; also the rocks are really sharp,” Kengkard said.

He said rescuers had not received any signs of life but he believed the men were still alive, as a survivor who managed to escape had informed them of a location deeper inside the cave that was above water level.

“I’m confident that they are still alive because there is still air in the cave,” said Kengkard, who was part of the diving team in the Tham Luang cave rescue, when 12 young footballers and their coach were brought to safety after more than two weeks in a flooded cave in Thailand’s Chiang Rai province.

Rescuers managed to reach a location 40 metres away from the area where they suspected the group may be sheltering but were unable to continue on Sunday night as persistent rains had brought sediment into the passageways, blocking access.

Kengkard said: “The gap is only 50cm wide, it’s really small, so we need to clear out the sediment from this spot first. The gap is quite low to crawl through, and we have to tilt to at a 45 degree angle.”

Mikko Paasi, a Finnish diver who also worked on the Tham Luang rescue, and Norrased Palasing, a Thai diver, joined rescue workers in Laos on Monday.

Rescuers had stayed overnight at the site because reaching the cave complex involved a 5km hike up mountainous terrain, said Jakkrit Taengtang, a Thai rescue technician with the Saithan Saphanboon Foundation, in a Facebook update on Sunday.

“The difficulty of this operation depends on the rain … We had to retreat earlier because of the water level rising in the cave,” Jakkrit said.

It is not clear if the trapped group were searching for gold ore as part of small-scale artisanal activity or were working for a mining company.

Alluvial mining, which includes mining for valuable minerals such as gold, diamonds, and platinum, has boomed in Laos over recent years, with research by the Stimson Center, a US thinktank, suggesting almost 200 such mines opened between 2023 and 2025. Last year the government announced a ban on any new permits for alluvial gold mining due to environmental concerns.