TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsAt least eight killed in Pakistan mine blast
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Pakistani miners shift an injured colleague on a stretcher to carry him to the hospital after the collapse of coal mine in Quetta on May 5, 2018.
Sixteen miners were killed and nine others were wounded on May 5 when a coal mine collapsed due to a gas explosion in southwestern Pakistan, officials said.
(AFP/Banaras Khan)
A
blast at a coal mine has killed at least eight workers on the outskirts of Pakistan's southwestern city of Quetta, officials said on Monday, with five more feared dead.
The mine caved in after the miners used dynamite during an excavation in Sinjidi, some 45 kilometres (28 miles) east of Quetta, the capital of oil and gas rich Balochistan province.
"There were up to 22 workers present in different tunnels in the mine, some who were as deep as 4,000 feet (1,219 metres) when the blast occurred," provincial chief mines inspector Muhammad Iftikhar told AFP.
Nine workers who were in the upper tunnels were pulled to safety, he said, but rescue teams later found the dead bodies of eight miners at the depth of 800 feet (240 metres).
He said rescue teams were still working to find the remaining five miners, but do not expect to find them alive.
Provincial secretary for mines Saleh Muhammad Baloch confirmed the incident and casualties.
He said that while the use of dynamite in the mines is officially prohibited, "the miners often use this explosive to quickly excavate."
Coal mines in the impoverished province are notorious for poor safety standards.
In a similar incident, at least 43 miners were killed in Sorange district of Balochistan in 2011.
Rich in mineral wealth, Balochistan is plagued by Islamist and separatist insurgencies.
Hundreds of people have died in the violence since 2004.
