Rescuers pulled more bodies from a Siberian coal mine on Tuesday as investigators tried to pinpoint what sparked a methane gas explosion that killed 107 people in Russia's deadliest mining disaster in a decade.
Three days of mourning were called in the entire coal-rich region known as the Kuzbass where the Ulanyovskaya mine was located and where most of the population works in mining or mining-related industries.
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a thorough investigation of the accident.
A federal Emergency Situation Ministry officer put the death toll at 107 on Tuesday night, while three others were still missing; 93 had been rescued earlier.
Regional Governor Aman Tuleyev said about 20 top mine officials, including its chief engineer, who were in the mine checking on the operation of a British-made hazard monitoring system, were among the dead.
Sergei Cheremnov, a spokesman for the regional government, said a British employee of the British-German mining consultancy IMC had also been killed.
Some 200 workers were underground at the time of the blast, which occurred early on Monday at a depth of around 270m, officials said. Two of the three miners injured in the blast were hospitalized in intensive care.
"There was a bang and smoke then the rescuers came. We switched on our safety kits and started going to the surface. Five of us came out. First they helped me to walk then it was all normal and I came back to my senses," one miner, Alexei Loboda, told First Channel television.
Nikolai Kultyn, an inspector with federal industrial regulator Rostekhnadzor, said there were no gas monitors where the pocket of methane gas had accumulated. He said the high number of deaths was likely due to the fact that many people were in a small area at the time of the blast.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was