Tarbela T-5 work halted after protective bund breach floods tunnel
A protective bund at Pakistan’s Tarbela 5th Extension hydropower project breached on Monday, flooding Tunnel Five. Officials said all workers were evacuated, one was rescued from the water, and no casualties were reported. Construction was suspended indefinitely pending an inquiry. This was not a failure of the main Tarbela Dam.
A protective bund at the Tarbela Dam’s T-5 hydropower extension project in Haripur, Pakistan, breached on Monday, 9 November 2026, allowing a large volume of water to flood Tunnel Five and forcing an indefinite halt to construction, local officials said.
Haripur Deputy Commissioner Waseem Ahmed visited the site and confirmed that water entered the tunnel after the protective structure gave way. He said district administration and rescue agencies evacuated all Pakistani and foreign workers to a safe location. One Pakistani worker was swept into the water as the tunnel flooded and was rescued by emergency teams; Ahmed said no casualties had been reported, according to Express Tribune and Minute Mirror.
Ahmed said construction and development work on the T-5 project had been suspended indefinitely while an investigation examines whether structural weakness or a technical fault caused the breach. Further decisions would follow the inquiry report.
The incident involves a temporary protective works structure at the Tarbela 5th Extension Hydropower Project — a WAPDA scheme on Tunnel No. 5 designed to add about 1,530 megawatts through three 510 MW units — not a collapse of the main Tarbela Dam itself. Viral social posts that frame the event as the dam “breaking” overstate what officials have described.
WAPDA awarded a civil-works contract for the project to China’s Power Construction Corporation of China Limited in May 2021. The scheme, backed by World Bank and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank financing, has already faced repeated delays, with completion pushed toward 2027, and a temporary suspension in August 2025 after rising reservoir levels sent water into the construction site.