An Israeli delegation will leave for Thailand on Saturday night to help in search and rescue efforts after the earthquake that shook the country and neighboring Myanmar the previous day.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed Israeli National Security Council head Tzachi Hanegbi to dispatch a delegation of experts to help with the rescue of 81 workers trapped under a high-rise building that collapsed in Bangkok.
The 21-member team, led by Col. (res.) Yossi Pinto, the commander of the IDF’s reserve national Search and Rescue Unit, was slated to depart from Ben-Gurion International Airport on an El Al flight at 10:30 p.m.
Israeli officials were quoted by Israel Hayom as saying, “The delegation will assist in constructing an intelligence picture for population-based and engineering-based rescue operations and will continue working until the last trapped individual is rescued.”
The death toll from the 7.7 magnitude earthquake that struck on Friday morning, whose epicenter was located close to Mandalay in Myanmar, has exceeded 1,600, according to authorities.
It was the most powerful quake in Myanmar in more than a century, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS).
In Thailand, dozens have been reportedly killed.
The Israeli rescue mission is set to arrive at the site of a 33-floor building that was under construction, Israel Hayom reported. Several construction workers were confirmed dead, while scores of others remain trapped underneath the rubble.
