Six dead in mine blast

An apparent methane blast ripped through a coal mine in Siberia early today, killing at least six miners and trapping dozens more underground, officials said.

Thirteen miners were rescued or made it to the surface on their own after the blast at the Taizhina mine in the Kemerovo region, said Valery Neklyudov, a duty officer in the Siberian regional emergency situations department.

He said rescuers were still searching for 33 others.

Three of the survivors were hospitalised with minor injuries, Neklyudov said. He said the cause of the accident was unknown, but the ITAR-Tass and Interfax news agencies reported that it was a methane blast.

The governor of the coal-mining region 1,850 miles east of Moscow, Aman Tuleyev, arrived at the mine in the town of Osinniki to oversee rescue operations, ITAR-Tass reported.

The blast was the first major accident at the western Siberian mine, where 600 miners work.

Accidents are common in the Russian coal industry, and miners stage frequent protests over wage delays and declining safety standards.

An investigation indicated a methane blast, possibly caused by a spark from a short circuit, caused a ceiling collapse that killed 12 workers at another mine in the Kemerovo region last June.