Trapped miners may survive

Anne Robi

ROBITHE families of fourteen miners who are currently trapped in the collapsed Chinese RZ Gold mine at Nyarugusu in Geita Region may now have hope of re-uniting with their loved ones after the Acting Commissioner of Minerals, Engineer Ally Samaje, con-firmed yesterday that the ongoing rescue efforts were at a good stage.

A least 14 people, including a Chinese, were reportedly dead on Thursday in a gold mine at Nya-rugusu after a pile of sand collapsed covering them underground.In a telephone interview with the ‘Sunday News’ from the scene yesterday, Eng Samaje said that the rescue team had been able to dig about 35 meters deep and reached a rock surface that shows a direction to the victims’ site.
“So far we have not yet had any communication with them (the trapped 14 miners) but the efforts of rescuing them indicate the possibility of finding them alive,” he said adding that at the rock surface, the rescuers spotted a direction with mud and were carrying on an assessment on how to go about it
.“The rescuers have spotted a direction with mud adjacent to the rock surface (35meters deep) and the possibility is that the direction leads to the gold mine site where the victims are trapped.
The rescue team is now removing the mud and assess-ing how to go about it and we expect to complete the work by today-night (yesterday-night) or tomorrow (today),” he noted.
If the miners will be rescued, the event will be similar to that of five small-scale miners who survived 41 days underground in Nyangarata, Ka-hama District, when the pit they were working in collapsed, trapping them underground.
The pit col-lapsed on October 5, 2015 and rescue efforts took 41 days before they were rescued.An estimated 20 miners were in the 120-metre pit when the accident occurred.
Only 14 made it out alive, while six remained trapped underground.
One miner was found dead but five miners escaped death miraculously.
The survivors were rushed to Kahama District Hospital for medical treatment.In their testimonies, the miners said with no food, they resorted to feeding on insects like cock-roaches and barks of poles used to support tunnels.
According to them, their colleague died after he re-fused to eat insects and became seriously weak due to hunger.
With three days underground, in what shall be described as a tale of survival fit for a movie script, the families of the trapped gold diggers in Nyarugusu will have a reason to smile if the miners will be rescued alive today.
According to Eng Samaje, despite the efforts of digging to reach the victims, the rescuers have planned to provide the victims with food and wa-ter through the pipes that supplies oxygen under-ground.
“We are planning to supply the victims with water and food through the pipes that supplies oxy-gen underground as the efforts underground goes on,” he noted.
Asked how sure he was that the victims would be found alive despite having spent three days un-derground, Engineer Samaje said that it was possible to find the victims alive noting that the situation only depends on the strength of the individuals.