Officials on Monday indefinitely suspended efforts to save six coal miners as a group of mining experts concluded that the area where the men were trapped was structurally unstable and would probably collapse again.
Robert Murray, chief executive of Murray Energy Corp, co-owner of the mine, said hopes of finding anyone alive were dim, a message he said he had relayed to relatives of the miners.
The miners were trapped on Aug. 6 in the Crandall Canyon Mine.
"I don't know whether the miners will be found," Murray said. "But I'm not optimistic."
A day earlier, relatives of the miners lashed out at officials and the mine's owners, faulting their rescue efforts as insufficient and asserting that that they were simply waiting for the six buried men to die.
A panel of eight mining experts from around the US met on Sunday and Monday, poring over records of seismic activity before concluding that further rescue activities would be unsafe.
Richard Stickler, a federal mining official who announced the panel's findings, said that if any of the miners were discovered alive, a hole would be dug to send a rescuer down to lift out survivors.
"The significant risk is unacceptable to send a rescuer miner underground for the purpose of exploration," said Stickler, an assistant secretary of labor and director of the US Mine Safety and Health Administration.
On Sunday, family members issued a statement saying Murray had promised to remove the miners dead or alive
Rescuers have drilled four holes into the Utah mine. A fifth hole, started on Sunday, had reached a depth of 259m by late afternoon on Monday, Stickler said, and was expected to reach its final depth of 621m by 5pm yesterday.
But earlier air samples found oxygen levels too low to support human life. Fresh air was being pumped into the holes, Stickler said, though a camera and sensors lowered last week detected no sign of life.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
‘POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE’: Leo Varadkar said he was ‘no longer the best person’ to lead the nation and was stepping down for political, as well as personal, reasons Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake.” A general election has to be held within a year. Irish Deputy Prime Minister Micheal Martin, leader of Fianna Fail, the main coalition partner, said Varadkar’s announcement was “unexpected,” but added that he expected the government to run its full term. An emotional Varadkar, who is in his second stint as prime minister and at
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia