The Pakistani security forces said yesterday that they had plucked eight people, including several schoolchildren, from a stranded cable car left hanging hundreds of feet above a mountain valley.
Video posted on social media showed one person scrambling out of the car and being lifted to safety by a rope attached to a helicopter hovering overhead. As darkness fell, however, helicopter operations had to be suspended, and officials instead employed a zip line to rescue those still trapped, according to the Pakistani military.
The cause of the accident remains unclear. The cable car is a regular mode of transportation for residents of the mountainous northern region. But such locally built systems are privately owned and tend toward relatively ad hoc construction.
