At least eleven miners were trapped more than a kilometre underground after a fire started by an electrical short circuit in a coal mine in southwestern Pakistan, officials said Monday.
Pakistani authorities said Tuesday they had rescued one miner who survived two days trapped in a coal mine after a fire that killed nine other workers in Balochistan.
Rescue efforts were hampered by the fire spreading poisonous carbon monoxide gas inside the mine, some 35 kilometres east of Quetta, the capital of oil and mineral rich Balochistan province.
Abdullah Shahwani, a top official for the industry in the province, said 11 miners were working on Sunday around 4,000 feet (1,200 metres) underground when the accident happened.Pakistani authorities said Tuesday they had rescued one miner who survived two days trapped in a coal mine after a fire that killed nine other workers in Balochistan.
An electrical short circuit sparked the blaze on Sunday at the mine east of Quetta, the capital of oil and mineral rich Balochistan province.
Eleven miners were working around 4,000 feet (1,200 metres) underground at the time. One was quickly saved but poisonous carbon monoxide gas hampered rescue efforts.
Officials confirmed on Tuesday that just one of the remaining ten had been discovered alive.
"We have found nine dead bodies," Abdullah Shahwani, a top provincial official for the industry, told AFP.
The surviving miner was critically injured, he said.
Provincial government spokesman Liaquat Shahwani confirmed the toll.
Most coal mines in the province are notorious for poor safety standards and facilities, and similar deadly accidents have occurred in the past.
