Rescuers in Burkina Faso called off a search on Monday after a flooded mine shaft collapsed, leaving dozens of illegal gold panners feared dead buried beneath tons of waterlogged dirt, local residents said.
The official toll from Thursday’s accident in Poura district was three dead and 10 reported missing but residents who counted the number of shoes left at the opening to the shaft said 46 were still believed to be underground.
”The rescuers cleared through to the flooded shaft but it became too dangerous and there is no longer any hope of finding survivors,” Abdoulaye Kikieta, prefect of Poura, told Reuters.
The mine at Poura, 160km south-west of the capital Ouagadougou, was the country’s biggest but was closed in 1999. Despite security measures to keep them out, gold panners have continued to excavate in treacherous conditions.
About 200 000 people are thought to be involved in gold panning in Burkina Faso, one of the world’s poorest countries sandwiched between Africa’s second- and third-biggest gold producers, Ghana and Mali.
The police in the West African country have not said what caused the collapse but it was believed to have followed the use of dynamite in the shaft, which descends 400m.
The mines ministry said in a statement it would reinforce security at Poura to stop all gold panning and speed up efforts to find a buyer for the mine, which has been shut since low gold prices forced its closure in 1999. — Reuters