Five people have been arrested in connection with
the July 11 colliery gas blast in Xinjiang
Uygur Autonomous Region that killed 83 miners, according to the
local government yesterday, and two other coal mine accidents
claimed at least five lives in Shanxi
and Hunan
provinces over the weekend.
The arrests of five Shenlong Coal Mine officials
were approved by the procuratorate of Fukang City on July 22, said
Chi Wenhui, deputy secretary of the government of Jichang Hui
Autonomous Prefecture.
The five being held responsible are: Jiang Jinpeng,
former board chairman of Shenlong Coal Mine Ltd Co that runs the
colliery, Liu Junbo, head of the mine, Ren Yanlu, director of its
production and technology section, Su Jindu, the deputy head in
charge of work safety, and Zhou Fuping, the dispatcher on duty at
the time of the blast.
Chi said some ventilators in the mine stopped
working, leaving gas accumulating in the shafts to reach dangerous
levels.
In addition, Chi said overproduction, absence of a
work safety license and bad management were also factors.
The colliery turned out 180,000 tons of coal in the
first half of this year, far exceeding its annual capacity of
30,000 tons and leading to an extremely high gas density in the
colliery shaft.
Gas levels had reached three percent, well above
the safety mark of one percent, three or four hours before the
blast occurred, said Chi.
It could have been avoided if the mine’s management
had taken effective measures to withdraw miners and cut electricity
underground right after detecting the high gas levels, he said.
The explosion took place around 2:30 AM two weeks
ago while 87 people were working underground. Only four of them
survived what a senior state work safety official described as
Xinjiang's worst coal mine accident in history.
An investigation launched by a State Administration
for Work Safety team is still underway.
At least four miners were fatally poisoned by gas
at a colliery in Tanghou Village of Puxian County in Shanxi at 9:55
PM on Saturday night, said Linfen City government sources
yesterday.
The city's coal mine safety administration said it
does not yet know how many miners were working underground when the
accident happened, so the number of people missing has not been
established.
The mine was undergoing safety improvements when
the accident occurred in order to qualify for a work safety
certificate, according to the administration.
A senior Linfen government official has arrived on
site to supervise rescue work and investigations into the cause of
the accident are underway.
One miner was also confirmed dead yesterday and
four others missing after an explosion at Shuangzishan Coal Mine in
Lengshuijiang City in Hunan at 7:40 AM on Sunday.
Zhang Tongming, an official from the local coal
mine safety regulator, said the deceased died of suffocation and
his body was found about 200 meters from the site of the
accident.
Gas and 500 tons of coal were ejected from the
mine, and it is still unclear how many miners were working
underground when it took place.
Another coal mine gas blast in the same city
claimed 22 miners' lives at Zijiang Coal Mine on June 8, injuring
nearly 40 others.
Lengshuijiang authorities ordered all coal mines to
suspend operations at an emergency meeting on July 22, but the
Shuangzishan colliery did not comply.
Investigation and rescue teams are working
underground.
(Xinhua News Agency July 25, 2005)