The Hindu : International : Toxic gas in mine kills 13

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Dec 23, 2004

International

International

Toxic gas in mine kills 13

BEIJING: Toxic gas killed 13 workers in a coal mine in northern China early on Wednesday, the Government said, in the latest accident to strike the nation's disaster-prone mining industry. Elsewhere, rescuers were searching for 36 miners missing for more than a week in a flooded coal mine in southern China. The deaths on Wednesday occurred in a township mine in Xiangning county in Shanxi province, a major coal-producing region, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. The 13 miners were sent down to close off a passageway leading to an adjacent mine, and they were later found dead, Xinhua said. It said a 14th miner survived and was being treated for injuries. ``All the casualties were caused by leakage of poisonous gas,'' the report said. At the mine in the southern province of Guizhou, rescuers who were looking for the miners missing since December 12 were using water pumps to drain flooded areas, Xinhua said. China's mines are by far the world's deadliest. Fires, cave-ins, floods and other disasters often are blamed on lack of required ventilation equipment to clear away gas that seeps from the coal beds, as well as a general indifference to safety rules.

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