Trapped workers emerge from pipe blast mine

An operation began today to rescue around 3,000 South African gold miners trapped a mile underground when a falling pipe damaged their lift.

The mine company began rescuing workers through a smaller shaft and estimated it would take 10 hours to get them all out.

Early today, a company spokesman said about 350 miners had been evacuated so far.

There were no injuries and there was no immediate danger to any of the workers in Harmony Gold Mining’s Elandsrand Mine, the company and union bosses said.

Peter Bailey, health and safety chairman for the National Mineworkers Union, said the first 74 men reached the surface shortly after 1am.

“They are all doing well,” he said.

The miners were trapped at a level slightly more than a mile underground when a hydraulic pressure pipe blew out at a weld at the mine outside Carletonville, a town near Johannesburg.

Harmony Chief Operating Officer Alwin Pretorius said the pipe fell down the shaft and probably caused extensive damage to the steel work and electrical cables in the shaft. Miners had to evacuated with a smaller cage in another shaft.

Sethiri Thibile, one of the first miners rescued, clutched a beef sandwich and a bottle of water he was given when he reached the surface.

“I was hungry, though we were all hungry,” said Thibile, 32, an engineering assistant who had been underground since 5am yesterday. He said there was no food or water in the mine.

“Most of the people are scared and we also have some women miners there underground,” said Thibile.

Harmony’s acting chief executive Graham Briggs said miners would be brought to the surface at intervals of every 25 to 30 minutes.

“It’s going to take some time because we are doing it carefully,” he said, adding the rescue could take 10 hours. “Nobody is injured, nobody is hurt, nothing like that at all.”

About 240 of the trapped miners had been in the shaft since 9-10pm on Tuesday night. The accident happened at 6.20am.

Miners emerged from the shaft with their faces covered with dust and the lamps on their hard hats still lit.

“We are still all right. I am a bit relieved but very, very hungry,” miner Jerry Lepolese said.

South Africa is the world’s largest producer of gold as well as a number of other minerals. Government statistics from 2005 said 55 different minerals were produced from 1,113 mines and quarries, of which 45 produced gold.

Harmony’s Elandsrand mine is the third largest producing gold mine in South Africa. The company says it produces an average of about 600 kilograms of gold every month.