Four dead and 49 missing in China mine collapse

The death toll from the collapse of an open pit coal mine in northern China has risen to four, with 49 people still missing, state broadcaster CCTV reported Thursday.

At least four people were killed in Wednesday’s disaster in the vast Inner Mongolia region’s Alxa League.

The official Xinhua News Agency said the landslide struck at 6 pm Wednesday (local time), about five hours after one of the pit’s walls caved in, burying workers and mining trucks under an estimated 10 million cubic meters (3.5 million tons) of sand and rock.

According to state media reports, about 900 rescuers with heavy equipment had arrived on the scene, including a team from the Ministry of Emergency Management who have been devising a rescue plan.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has demanded “all-out efforts in search and rescue” and for “ensuring the safety of people’s lives and property and maintaining overall social stability.”

The company running the mine, Inner Mongolia Xinjing Coal Industry Co. Ltd., was cited and fined last year for multiple safety violations ranging from insecure access routes to the mining surface to unsafe storage of volatile materials and a lack of training for its safety overseers, according to the news website The Paper.

Inner Mongolia is a key region for the mining of coal and various minerals and rare piles of earth, which critics say has ravaged the original landscape of mountains, grassy steppes, and deserts.

China overwhelmingly relies on coal for power generation but has tried to reduce the number of deadly mine accidents through a greater emphasis on safety and the closure of smaller operations that lack the necessary equipment.

Most mining deaths are attributed to explosions caused by the buildup of methane and coal dust, or to drownings caused when miners break into shafts that had been abandoned due to flooding.

China has recorded a slew of deadly industrial and construction accidents in recent months as a result of poor safety training and regulation, official corruption, and a tendency to cut corners by companies seeking to make profits. The economy has slowed, partly as a result of draconian lockdowns and quarantines imposed under the now-abandoned “zero Covid” policy.