AKIPRESS.COM - Rescuers on January 29 pulled out four miners who had spent 36 days trapped underground in a collapsed mine in eastern China, reports The Asahi Shimbun.
The gypsum mine in Shandong province collapsed on Christmas Day, killing one and leaving 17 missing, including the four survivors. In the days that followed, rescuers detected the four more than 200 meters below the surface.
Rescuers brought out the workers through two access tunnels they had drilled, and the first miner was pulled out in a capsule.
The collapse on December 25 was so violent it registered as a seismic event registering magnitude 4. Five days later, infrared cameras detected the four miners weak with hunger waving their hands. The miners told rescuers they were in underground passages that were intact, and rescuers began slowly drilling a route to save them. They sent food and clothes to the men through four small tunnels they drilled.
Eleven other people in the mine at the time of the collapse made it to safety or were rescued earlier.
Two days after the collapse, the owner of the mine, Ma Congbo, jumped into a well and drowned in an apparent suicide. Four top officials in Pingyi county, where the mine is located, have been fired.