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| Rescue team wait near the Pike River Coal mine offices, as 29 workers are still trapped inside the coal mine after an underground explosion, in Greymouth, New Zealand, Sunday, Nov. 21, 2010. |
GREYMOUTH, New Zealand (AP) -- The explosion that left 29 miners missing in New Zealand resembled "a shotgun blast, but much, much louder and more powerful," said a coal miner who was smashed into the mine wall before collapsing amid the smoky, swirling gas and dust.
When he came to, Daniel Rockhouse, 24, dragged himself upright and staggered to a nearby compressed air line to breathe in fresh air and gain some strength.
"I got up and there was thick white smoke everywhere - worse than a fire. I knew straight away that it was carbon monoxide," Rockhouse, whose brother Ben remains underground, told the New Zealand Herald newspaper in its Monday edition.
"I couldn't see anything, and it was dead quiet," he said. "I yelled, 'Help, somebody help me!' But no one came. There was no one there."
Toxic gases after Friday's explosion were still keeping rescuers from entering the mine near Atarau on South Island Monday, and evidence of heat underground was concerning officials, who feared there could be another blast.
Fresh air was being pumped down an open air line, but gas levels were still fluctuating wildly, authorities said.
A six-inch (15-centimeter) -wide hole is being drilled from the mountain above down 500 feet (150 meters) to the mine to assess air quality and to lower listening devices. The missing miners have not been heard from since the blast but officials insist the search for them is a rescue operation. The drill was expected to reach the mine wall overnight.
An open phone line to the bottom of the pit rings unanswered after nearly three days.
New Zealand's mining sector is generally safe. In China - which has the world's deadliest mines - water flooded a small coal mine Sunday, trapping 28 workers, officials said. Thirteen workers escaped and rescue work continued for the missing men.
The only other survivor in the New Zealand blast so far, Russell Smith told New Zealand's TV3 news that he was driving a loader into the mine when he saw a flash in front of him.
"It wasn't just a bang, finish, it just kept coming, kept coming, kept coming, so I crouched down as low as I could in the seat and tried to get behind this metal door, to stop getting pelted with all this debris," Smith said.
"I remember struggling for breath. I thought at the time it was gas, but ... it was dust, stone dust, I just couldn't breathe. And that's the last I remember," he said.
Shortly after, Rockhouse who was himself "drunk" from carbon monoxide poisoning and on weak legs came across another miner lying on the ground.
"I grabbed his hair and pulled his head back, and realized it was Russell Smith," he told the New Zealand Herald.
Unable to rouse him, Rockhouse grabbed Smith under the armpits and dragged him 550 yards (500 meters) to the fresh-air base. But it was filled with carbon monoxide.
They stumbled on, using the compressed air line for fresh air, and after an agonizing two-hour struggle, they finally emerged from the mine.
Both were treated at a hospital for minor injuries.
"I could have easily been blown to bits," Smith said, acknowledging he was lucky to have survived.
Smith said he couldn't help worrying about his colleagues still underground.
"There's a lot of young guys down there. A lot of people waiting," he said. "Whether they're still alive or dead or ... in an air pocket, you just don't know, because we're not too sure where the explosion was."
Anguished relatives of the missing miners were given a tour of the site Sunday in order to better understand the situation, but the emotional trip did little to allay their concerns.
"It was good to see the layout of the place, but it's still hard," said Laurie Drew, whose 21-year-old son, Zen, is missing. "We just want to be there when they walk out."
Police have said the miners, aged 17 to 62, are believed to be about 1.2 miles (two kilometers) down the main tunnel.
"Teams are on standby and at the first opportunity, day or night, they're going to go down in there," police superintendent Gary Knowles, the rescue controller, told Sky News television.
He could not say how long a rescue operation would take, given the unstable gas levels.
Officials believe the blast was most likely caused by coal gas igniting. An electricity failure shortly before the explosion may have caused ventilation problems that let gas build up.
The miners' union said Sunday there had been no previous safety issues at the mine.
"As far as I know, there had been pretty standard procedures in place and nothing ... that would have pointed to a potential risk was raised by workers," Andrew Little, spokesman for the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union, told reporters.
Australian and British citizens were among the missing men, and Australia sent a team of mine rescue experts to assist the operation.
The coal seam at the mine is reached through a 1.4-mile (2.3-kilometer) horizontal tunnel into the mountain. The seam lies about 650 feet (200 meters) beneath the surface. The vertical ventilation shaft rises 354 feet (108 meters) from the tunnel to the surface.
Each miner carried 30 minutes of oxygen, and more stored in the mine could allow several days of survival.
The 2-year-old Pike River mine is working the largest-known deposit of hard coking coal in New Zealand, about 58.5 million tons.
A total of 181 people have been killed in New Zealand's mines in 114 years. The worst disaster was in March 1896, when 65 died in a gas explosion. Friday's explosion occurred in the same coal seam.
The Pike River coal mine differs from the Chilean gold and copper mine where 33 men were rescued after being trapped 69 days. Methane gas was not a concern at the Chilean mine, but its only access shaft was blocked, while the Pike River mine has two exits.
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