Five diamond miners missing since Tuesday after a mudslide deep underground at a Kimberley mine are presumed dead, mining minister Gwede Mantashe said on Friday after assessing rescue efforts.
Mantashe told a press conference it was now a question of retrieving their bodies, the SABC reported.
The miners were trapped more than 800m underground in the early hours of Tuesday when there was a “mud-rush” at the Ekapa mine in the Northern Cape.
Ekapa Minerals, the company that operates the mine, said all operations were stopped immediately after the incident and that rescue efforts were continuing.
“The time passed since the event is a major concern but there is no change in approach to the rescue activities and we are not giving up hope,” Ekapa Minerals general manager Howard Marsden said in a statement.
Mantashe said in a separate statement that an investigation would be conducted to find out what had happened.
The government and mining industry have been making efforts to reduce mine deaths and injuries, part of a campaign called “Zero Harm”. Last year South Africa recorded its lowest-ever number of mine deaths, 41.
Ekapa Minerals said it had been briefing the families of the trapped miners, who held a vigil near the mine on Thursday night.
Reuters
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