It's been nine days since the boys and their football coach went missing. Doctors say their survival depends of them having found drinkable water.
ADVERTISEMENTRescuers in Thailand rescued 12 boys and their soccer coach who had been trapped in a cave in Thailand for nine days, according to the Chiang Rai Governor.
"Thai Navy seals have found all 13 with signs of life," Governor Narongsak Osottanakorn told reporters.
Rescuers had scrabbled to clear a constricted passageway for divers deep inside a flooded cave complex on Monday as the search for 12 boys and their soccer coach entered a ninth day.
The divers from a Thai navy SEAL unit were within 500 metres of a chamber containing an elevated rock mound, nicknamed "Pattaya Beach" by cavers, which could have provided the boys with a refuge when heavy rains flooded the cave, blocking the way out.
Progress had been slowed as divers needed to widen parts of a narrow 100-metre stretch that they were unable to pass through sharp bends without their air cylinders becoming jammed.
"Today's aim is to widen this hole," Chiang Rai governor Narongsak Osatanakorn told reporters earlier on Monday.
The boys, aged between 11 and 16, and their 25-year-old coach disappeared on June 23 during an outing to the Tham Luang cave, which runs for 10 kilometres beneath the mountains in northern Chiang Rai province.
Aside from belongings left at the mouth of the cave and handprints on the walls, no trace of them had been found since.
National news bulletins had been dominated by updates from the mammoth search involving more than 1,000 personnel, including rescue teams from the United States, Britain, Japan and elsewhere.
Doctors had said the boys could survive for days without food, but much would depend on whether they found water clean enough to drink.
The heavy seasonal rains hampered the search operation, with divers groping their way along the cave walls, barely able to see in the muddy water, but the pumps had helped to bring down water levels in recent days.
Narongsak said that an operations centre has been set up in the third chamber, about 1.7 kilometres from entrance to the cave.