An explosion at a coal mine in remote north-eastern China killed 134 workers and left another 15 trapped underground, China News Service said on Monday, amid frantic rescue efforts to find survivors.
A total of 221 miners were underground when the cave-in occurred at about 9.40pm local time on Sunday at the state-run Dongfeng coal mine, near Qitaihe city in Heilongjiang province, not far from the Russian border with Siberia.
However, after a day of intense rescue efforts, 72 survivors had been pulled from the rubble, said the semi-official China News Service.
Officials at the mine refused to detail the situation or the death toll, but video on China Central Television (CCTV) showed gaping holes in numerous places at the mine site where explosions had ripped through the earth.
”It’s all the management’s fault,” a woman surnamed Ge, whose nephew and brother-in-law were among the missing, said outside the gates of the mine. ”They knew all along that there were safety problems, but they wouldn’t do anything about it.”
A dozen other relatives of those missing hung around the mine gates in temperatures near -15 degrees Celsius, some crying or sobbing and others refusing to speak with journalists.
Ambulances were seen rushing out of the mine gates.
”We just had a meeting, the rescue work is going on,” said a man who refused to identify himself, other than as a mine worker. ”They said that some 70 miners have been rescued.”
China News Service said rescue teams of 380 people were involved in the search for those still trapped.
Explosion
Investigators said the accident was caused by a coal-dust explosion, which knocked out all the ventilation systems in the pit, according to Xinhua news agency.
A coal-dust explosion is often caused when there is a gas blast, which ignites the coal dust suspended in the air or stuck on walls, Professor Rui Susheng from the China Coal Research Institute said.
Heilongjiang Longmei Group, a mining conglomerate of four major state-owned coal businesses with a registered capital of 13-billion yuan ($1,6-billion), owns the Dongfeng mine, Xinhua said.
Although many of the accidents in China’s coal industry occur in illegal mines, the work safety watchdog said the Dongfeng mine is fully licensed.
An official from the Dongfeng mine-production management office said the mine is one of the smaller ones in the Longmei group with an annual capacity of 500 000 tonnes a year.
The accident came as the government said on Monday that all 18 miners trapped in a flooded coal mine in northern Hebei province since Thursday last week have been confirmed dead.
Safety
The government has this year been trying to step up safety measures for the nation’s coal mines, closing down more than 9 000 illegal operations and suspending another 12 990, according to state press reports.
China’s mines are regarded as the most dangerous in the world, and the problem has worsened in recent years as demand for raw materials has escalated to help fuel the nation’s rapid economic growth.
China relies on coal for two-thirds of its energy needs and the government said early this month it intends to increase domestic coal production from 2,1-billion tonnes to 2,4-billion tonnes over the next five years.
More than 6 000 miners died in accidents in China last year, according to previously released government figures. Independent estimates say the real figure could be as high as 20 000.
The Dongmei mine disaster is one of the deadliest in recent years for China.
A gas explosion at a coal mine in north Shaanxi province on November 28 last year killed 166 workers.
On February 14 this year, 214 miners were killed in a gas explosion at a coal mine in north-east Liaoning province, while the flooding of an illegal coal mine in the southern province of Guangdong killed 123. — Sapa-AFP