More than 100 feared dead in mine blast

The death toll is 16 people at an illegally operated coal mine in China’s southeastern province of Jiangsu. An explosion ripped through the mine on Sunday.

Reuters is reporting that rescue officials hold out little hope for about 76 others, who were trapped while working in a shaft 260 metres below the surface.

So far 13 miners, three of them women, have been rescued alive, says an official in charge of the rescue operation. Fifteen bodies have been recovered.

Xinhua, the state-run news agency, says the explosion, which occurred at 9.13 a.m., resulted from a build-up of gas in the mine in Xuzhou, about 300 km north of the provincial capital of Nanjing.

Already this year, almost 3,000 people have been killed in mining accidents in China. Last year, the industry reported a total of 5,300.

The Chinese government launched a crackdown on tens of thousands of such illegal small-scale mines earlier this summer, but rampant unemployment keeps the mines running.

Xinhua says the mine did not have a license and was ordered to halt production last month as part of the crackdown, but it re-opened earlier this month.

The mine’s contractor had been detained.