THE four geological workers reported missing since Nov. 13 in the Ailao Mountains in Yunnan Province were confirmed dead when three of them were found Sunday night and the other was found yesterday morning, the Zhenyuan County Government said yesterday.

At around 7:30 p.m. Nov. 15, the county government received a report that the four staff members of the Kunming Natural Resources Comprehensive Survey Center of China Geological Survey lost contact with the center after they entered the Ailao Mountains on Nov. 13 in the county.

The local government carried out rescue work and over 3,700 rescuers from the county and nearby Yuxi City have joined the work in the past days, CCTV News reported.

“The four workers entered the mountains to carry out a forest resources survey,” Wang Hongdong, director of the Ailao Mountains National Nature Reserve’s Zhenyuan Bureau, told CCTV on Friday. “They carried compasses, engineer shovels, and some other tools, as well as food that can support them for one and a half days.”

Wang added that the four missing workers, aged between 25 and 32, once served as soldiers.

“We have preliminarily determined the cause for their disappearance — misjudging locations,” he said.

The continuous rain from Nov. 14 to 16 in the reserve lowered the temperature and brought thick fog, and the poor visibility might have caused them to misjudge locations, according to Wang.

The regions where they lost contact featured some of the most complicated terrain in the Ailao Mountains. Therefore, it was quite difficult for the four workers to find the right way when lost and the rough terrain may have brought the risk of injuries, he said.

(China Daily)