Twenty-nine miners were killed and 19 others injured in a coal mine blast in Gansu Province.

The explosion occurred on 31 October at the Weijiadi Mine in Baiyin city, about 100 kilometres northwest of Lanzhou, the provincial capital, when 71 miners were working underground.

A ventilation system was being checked when the blast occurred, according to Wang Jun, general manager of Jingyuan Coal Industry Corporation which owns the mine.

Workers above ground only realised an accident had happened when the gas monitoring and communication systems suddenly blacked out more than one hour after the explosion occurred. They immediately started emergency procedures, Wang said.

Meanwhile, only one day after the accident, sixteen coal miners were trapped after a landslide in another coal mine in Gansu. The landslide occurred this morning (1 November) in Deshun Coal Mine Fields in Honggu district of Lanzhou.

Ding Yongqing, an official with the Lanzhou Work Safety Bureau, said the landslide blocked the pithead of the mine, trapping all 16 miners underground, and buried some houses nearby.

More than 6,000 miners are killed in coal mine accidents every year, according to official figures, but sources told China Labour Bulletin that the real figure should be as high as 20,000 each year and many accidents were not reported due to cover-up by local government officials and mine owners.

Sources: Xinhua News Agency (31 October 2006), Agence France-presse (31 October 2006), China Labour Bulletin

1 November 2006