Workers rescued from mine
Miners were trapped underground for two weeks
ELEVEN workers trapped for two weeks down a Chinese gold mine have been brought safely to the surface, a landmark achievement for an industry blighted by disasters and high death tolls.
State broadcaster CCTV showed workers being hauled up one by one in baskets yesterday afternoon, their eyes shielded to protect them after so many days in darkness.
Some brought their hands together in gratitude and many appeared almost too weak to stand.
They were swiftly covered in coats in freezing temperatures and loaded into ambulances.
Hundreds of rescue workers and officials applauded as the workers were brought up from the Hushan mine in Qixia, a jurisdiction under the city of Yantai in the eastern coastal province of Shandong.
One worker was reported to have died from a head wound after an explosion deposited 70 tons of rubble in the shaft on January 10 while the mine was still being built.
The fate of 10 others who were underground at the time is unknown.
Authorities have detained mine managers for delaying reporting the accident.
The cause of the accident is under investigation but the explosion was big enough to block the shaft, disabling lifts and trapping the workers underground.
Rescuers drilled parallel shafts to send down food and drinks and eventually bring up the survivors.
Ten of the workers had been in a lower chamber and one in a separate area slightly closer to the surface.
Protracted and expensive rescue efforts are relatively new in China’s mining industry, which used to average 5,000 deaths per year.