166 Feared Dead in Chinese Mine Blast

Nov. 29, 2004
CBC News

BEIJING - Chinese authorities say 141 miners trapped in an underground gas explosion Sunday have no chance of survival, bringing the toll from the disaster to 166 and making it the country's worst mining disaster in four years.

The explosion in the Chenjiashan coal mine in Shaanxi province in northern China killed at least 25 miners outright. Another 127 escaped or were rescued, mostly workers stationed near the mine's entrance.

The rest of the shift were trapped underground, where a local Communist Party secretary says poison gas and a lack of ventilation would have left them without even a one-per-cent chance of making it out alive.

Just two days before the blast, the provincial government had ordered tougher mine inspections, but safety regulations are often ignored in mines under pressure to produce fuel for China's booming economy.

The provincial government had now ordered all the mines with high gas concentration to halt operations for safety checks.

This is the third major mining disaster in China this month.

Big accidents like the one at the Chenjiashan coal mine are shown on state television, but countless other small disasters go unreported.

China's mining industry is the world's most dangerous, with more than 4,000 miners killed in accidents so far this year.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2004/11/29/china-mine-041129.html