At least 22 miners died, another 17 were injured and some thirty are still trapped after an explosion recorded this Friday at a coal mine in Amasra, in the Turkish province of Bartin, along the Black Sea coast, the government reported.
In the explosion, which occurred around 6:15 p.m. local time, in a shaft of an Amasra coal mine in Bartin, at least 22 people have lost their lives, reported the Minister of Health, Fahrettin Koca, and work continues. rescue.
Of the 17 injured, 8 are in intensive care, four are treated on an outpatient basis and 5 in the field hospital established at the site of the disaster, Koca said on his Twitter account.
Shortly before, the Minister of the Interior, Süleyman Soylu, said that 110 miners were working in the mine and 49 of them were in the area affected by the explosion.
The governor of the province of Bartin, Nurtaç Arslan, had previously explained that 44 miners were at the 300-meter level, where the explosion took place, and another 5 at 350 meters below ground.
Turkish Energy Minister Fatih Dönmez, who has also attended Amasra, told the media that according to initial assessments the disaster was caused by a firedamp explosion.
“There are several partial collapses,” explained Dönmez, which is why an as yet undetermined number of miners are trapped in the mine, possibly about 30, Amasra mayor Recai Çakir told the media.
“We don’t know anything. There was dust and smoke, we couldn’t see what happened. I got out by myself. Those of us who were a little far away just felt the pressure of the explosion, but we couldn’t see anything,” a miner told NTV. who got out of the well before rescue teams arrived.
According to the Turkish newspaper Evrensel, a report from the Court of Auditors (Sayistay) had already drawn attention to this well in 2019, indicating that high gas leaks with the risk of explosion had been registered.
Turkey regularly suffers serious accidents in coal and lignite mines, which unions blame on poor safety measures in a poorly regulated and controlled sector.
The biggest disaster took place in May 2014 at a mine in Soma, in the western province of Manisa, when 301 miners died in a fire caused by an electrical explosion in a shaft.
