Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur announced on Saturday that 10 residents from his province were among the 12 miners who lost their lives when a coal mine collapsed in the Sanjidi area of Balochistan.
The incident took place on Thursday after a methane gas explosion which led to the collapse of the mine and trapped 12 miners inside.
Rescue teams from the Balochistan Department of Minerals and the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) recovered the bodies of four miners on Friday after hours of effort.
In a statement released on Saturday, Chief Minister Gandapur expressed his condolences and said 10 of the deceased miners were from Shangla district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. “We share the grief of the grieving families,” he added.
Balochistan’s chief mine inspector, Abdul Ghani, said Friday that workers were extracting coal at a depth of 4,000 feet when the explosion occurred. The explosion caused the entire mine to collapse.
He further mentioned that the Ministry of Minerals would conduct a full investigation to ascertain the security measures taken by the mine owners.
Balochistan’s mines, which are controlled by private companies through lease agreements with the government, are notorious for dangerous working conditions and poor safety standards, making fatal accidents all too common.
According to the Balochistan Department of Minerals, there were 46 mining accidents last year that claimed the lives of 82 miners.
Balochistan is rich in coal reserves with large deposits in areas such as Mach, Hernai and Chamalang. However, the use of outdated mining methods has contributed to frequent accidents in the region.
Last March, a gas explosion in a coal mine in the Khost area of Hernai killed 12 workers.
In 2021, three major accidents in Marwar, Hernai and other areas of Balochistan led to the death of 22 workers.
Similarly, more than 100 miners lost their lives in such accidents in 2020, and 52 of these died in Duki district.
