Turkey mine explosion kills at least 22 people, leaves 49 buried

The explosion at a coal mine in Bartin, northern Turkey, killed at least 22 workers on Friday, according to Health Minister Fahrettin Koca. Koca also said that 17 were injured and were being treated.

It is unclear whether the deaths involve employees who were trapped in the structure. In parallel with the announcement by the federal ministry, the governor of Bartin, Nursac Aslan, had said that eight workers had managed to escape on their own, but that there were still “44 people 300 [metros abaixo da entrada da mina] and another 5 to 350 [metros]”.

Footage shown by local TV stations showed the wounded being taken to ambulances and a crowd of rescue workers on the outskirts of the facility.

The explosion occurred around 18:15 local time (12:15 GMT). At first, Turkey’s Disaster Management Authority attributed the accident to an electrical transformer failure. He later backtracked on the information, saying that the cause of the explosion was still unknown.

The main hypothesis raised by experts heard in the Turkish press is that an explosion caused by the accumulation of firedamp — a flammable gas, formed mainly of methane, released in coal mines.

There are no fires going on inside the mine and the internal ventilation is working properly, said Energy Minister Fatih Donmez, adding that there have been partial collapses inside the mine.

Located in the city of Amasra, about 300 kilometers from Ankara, the mine is managed by Empresa Turca de Coal, a state-owned mining company.

In 2014, Turkey witnessed the worst industrial accident in its history. In the town of Soma, near the Aegean coast, an explosion, also in a transformer, left 787 miners trapped below ground.

The explosion resulted in a fire, which killed 301 miners. The remaining 486 were rescued. At the time, Erdogan was considered insensitive in reacting to those deaths, prompting protests against his rule.