Mining disaster Siberia

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WE've discussed Mining disasters before in this particular forum so thought I'd post in case it is of interest again. it was posted online by 9:30 am Pacific time, I dont see the incident report time listed as yet, I'm looking. Granny

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070319/ap_ ... mine_blast

By MIKE ECKEL, Associated Press Writer

MOSCOW - A methane gas explosion ripped through a Siberian coal mine Monday, killing at least 61 miners among nearly 200 working underground in one of the deadliest mining accidents in Russia in the past decade.
Sergei Salov, a spokesman for the federal Emergency Situations Ministry, said 75 miners were rescued and 61 killed in the explosion at Ulyanovskaya mine.
Nearly 200 miners were working in the mine in the coal-rich southern Kuzbass region when the blast occurred early Monday. At least five were injured in the explosion, emergency officials said.
Emergency Situations Ministry spokeswoman Alina Avyazova said rescue workers were in contact with surviving miners underground. It was not clear whether they were in immediate danger.
The Ulyanovskaya mine is in Novokuznetsk, a sprawling city about 1,850 miles east of Moscow in a coal-rich swath of south-central Siberia known as the Kuzbass. The hardscrabble city is set among hills crowded with active and abandoned coal mines amid a grim industrial landscape.
The mine ? operated by Yuzhkuzbassugol, an affiliate of Russian coal and steel company Evraz Group SA ? opened in 2002 and produces 3.3 million U.S. tons of coal a year, according to the RIA-Novosti news agency.
A blast at a mine on the outskirts of Novokuznetsk killed 47 workers in 2004 ? the deadliest in the region since 1997, when a methane explosion at a mine in the city killed 67.
At least 30 workers died in Russian mining accidents last year, including 25 who perished in a fire at a Siberian gold mine. In the U.S. last year, 47 workers died in mine accidents.