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1 August, 2011
Three separate mine tragedies last week caused the deaths of 36 miners in eastern Ukraine, with the death toll likely to climb with rescue efforts still incomplete and some miners in life-threatening conditions in hospitals. The worst occurred in the early morning hours of Friday, 29 July, when a methane gas explosion in a Metinvest B.V. coal mine in Lugansk Region killed 18. Eight miners are still missing.
On the same day, hours later and in adjoining Donetsk Region, seven miners were instantly killed when a headframe at the state-owned Bazhanova mine near Makiyivka collapsed. The collapse sent an elevator hurling downward, killing the seven. Another three miners are unaccounted for and four were rescued and are hospitalised in serious condition.
Families of the lost miners
The third tragedy occurred in another state-run mine in the Donbass of Donetsk Region on 26 July. Three miners are dead, another three are missing and feared dead when a roof collapsed 520 metres underground at the Rodynska colliery.
The Metinvest gas blast at the former state-owned Sukhodolskaya-Vostochnaya coal mine near Krasnodon, Lugansk, happened at a depth of 915 metres and stands as Ukraine’s worst mine tragedy since 101 miners were killed in a series of explosions in November 2007 at the privately-held Zasyadko company mine in the Donbass.
Demitry Kalitventsev, the branch leader of the Ukrainian Coal Industry Workers’ Union (PRUP) in Lugansk, feared the death toll could exceed 30 because another nine miners who were rescued have extreme burns and their conditions are not good. It’s been reported that the mine had modern safety equipment and detection devices, but consistently languished under high gas methane readings.
Families of the victims are to receive UAH 1 million (US$125,000), it was reported. Metinvest is 75% owned by Rinat Akhmetov’s System Capital Management Group (SCM) and 25% by Smart Holding Group. Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest individual, is a Party of Regions bankroller and a member of Ukraine’s Parliament, the Rada. Metinvest of late has grown into one of Ukraine’s largest steel producers with a number of acquisitions. Smart Holding has major interests in shipbuilding, construction, port management, and metallurgy and mining.