Rescuers drill holes to reach miners

Beijing – Chinese rescuers drilled several fresh holes yesterday to reach at least 12 gold miners trapped underground for nine days as dwindling food supplies and rising waters threatened their survival.

Twenty-two workers have been stuck 540 metres underground at the Hushan mine near Yantai in east China’s Shandong province after an explosion damaged the entrance.

After days without any signs of life, some of the trapped miners managed to send up a note attached to a metal wire which rescuers had dropped into the mine on Sunday.

Pleading for help, the handwritten message said a dozen of them were alive but surrounded by water and in need of urgent medical supplies.

Several of the miners were injured, the note said.

A subsequent phone call with the miners revealed 11 were in one location 540 metres below the surface with another – apparently alone – trapped a further 100 metres down.

The whereabouts and condition of the other 10 miners is still unknown.

Rescuers have already dug three channels and sent food, medicine, paper and pencils down thin shafts – lifelines to the miners cut into the earth.

But progress was slow, according to Chen Fei, a top city official.

“The surrounding rock near the ore body is mostly granite... that is very hard, resulting in slow progress of rescue,” said Chen on Monday evening.

“There is a lot of water in the shaft that may flow into the manway and pose a danger to the trapped workers.” –