SOUTH African mines minister, Gwede Mantashe, commended the rescue of 644 gold miners at the premises of Modder East, a mine owned by Gold One, where an underground fire had broken out in the early hours of July 26.
All of the employees evacuated to the mine’s refuge bays wherein they were rescued from and brought to surface, said the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR).
“We commend all the rescue teams involved, as well as the mine employees and management, for their swift action in ensuring that we avert a potential disaster,” said Mantashe. We reiterate our call to mining companies to prioritise the safety of mineworkers, and to ensure that everyone adheres to the guidelines provided for safety at the mines,” he added.
Six miners lost their lives in an underground fire that broke out at Palabora Copper in South Africa’s Limpopo province. It was the latest in a number of extraordinary mine fatalities to have befallen the country’s mining sector.
In May, an earthquake at Sibanye-Stillwater’s Driefontein on May 3 caused an fall of ground that killed seven miners. And then in June, five miners died at the company’s Kloof gold mine after they appeared to have contravened safety rules by accessing an abandoned section of the mine.
The DMR has called a safety summit for September as mining fatalities look set to increase for a second successive year. There had been a steady decline in the number of on-mine deaths in the previous 10 years.
