Serious mining accident in Poland: Two dead recovered - more miners buried
Created: 04/24/2022, 17:07
In the south of Poland, a second mining accident has occurred in just a few days.
Two miners have been recovered dead.
WARSAW - Ten miners were missing at the Zofiowka coal mine in Jastrzebie-Zdroj after an earthquake on Saturday morning.
Two miners have since been recovered dead.
Eight other miners are still missing after the earthquake at the Zofiowka coal mine in the south of the country, mine operator JSW said on Sunday.
On Saturday, rescue workers located four of the miners buried in the Zofiowka mine.
According to JSW, rescue workers managed to rescue two of the workers in quick succession on Sunday.
A doctor was only able to determine the death of the men, the operating company said.
There is no contact with the two other missing persons who have already been located.
It is unclear whether they are still alive.
"Other rescue workers are still trying to restore ventilation in the mine shafts in order to reach the other six miners and rescue them once they are found," the JSW statement said.
Second serious mining accident in southern Poland
According to the operating company, the earthquake in the Zofiowka mine occurred on Saturday night at around 3:40 a.m. at a depth of 900 meters.
As a result, methane gas escaped from the mine.
42 of the 52 miners who were underground at the time of the accident were able to get out unharmed on their own.
Poland's head of government shocked by mine accident
Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki expressed his dismay at the recent accident on Saturday.
The news about the earthquake in the mine was "devastating," he said.
Poland's president fears death from buried miners
Polish President Andrzej Duda expressed pessimism about the fate of ten buried miners.
"There is a high probability that there are dead people in the Zofiowka mine, but we still hope that we can get the surviving miners out," said the head of state, who personally came to the scene of the accident on Saturday evening, to the PAP news agency.
Polish President Andrzej Duda has expressed pessimism about the fate of ten trapped miners.
© Zbigniew Meissner/dpa
Mine accident in Poland: Five fatalities in the Pniowek hard coal mine - search for missing persons stopped
Only on Wednesday, at least five people died in a methane explosion in a mine also operated by JSW in Pniowek, southern Poland, and seven more are missing.
A methane gas explosion occurred in the coal mine at a depth of around a thousand meters shortly after midnight.
A second explosion followed when rescue workers were already at the scene of the accident.
The blasts killed five people, including a rescue worker.
20 other people suffered injuries, some of them serious.
The search for the seven missing people was called off after another detonation on Friday.
JSW boss Tomasz Cudny called it "irresponsible" to continue the deployment of rescue workers.
(ml/dpa/afp)
