China says 95 workers found alive in flooded mine

At least 95 workers have been found alive in a Chinese coal mine more than a week after they were trapped by an underground flood, in what state media has hailed as a miracle rescue.

So far, 70 of the workers have been pulled out of the mine shaft in Shanxi province, China's coal producing heartland, state television reported. No fatalities have yet been reported.

"A total of 95 survivors have been identified and I expect there will be more to be found in the flooded mine," the Communist party boss in Shanxi province, Zhang Baoshun, was quoted by Xinhua news agency as saying.

Scores of ambulances lined the road out of the mine to transport the survivors after their ordeal, while numerous hospitals in the region have been getting ready to take in the men, the report said.

A total of 153 workers had been trapped in the state-owned Wangjialing mine in Shanxi since it flooded during construction work on March 28, an accident blamed on lax safety standards.

China Central Television showed survivors being brought out of the mine pit one after another, strapped to stretchers and wrapped in green blankets.

Towels covered their eyes and blackened faces to protect them from lights after so long underground.

Groups of rescue workers wearing blue and orange jumpsuits loaded them into awaiting ambulances, while medical personnel dressed in white administered intravenous drips and oxygen.

"I have not slept for several days," black-faced rescuer Wei Fusheng told state television as he wept with joy. "Our efforts have not been in vain."

Footage of the rescue scenes played throughout the day as China marked its annual "grave sweeping day," a national holiday to mourn the dead.

Thousands of people lined the road from the mine, applauding as ambulances carrying the first survivors rushed past, Xinhua said, while state media widely described the rescue as a "miracle".

Medical workers found that the vital signs of most of the survivors taken to hospital were "basically stable," state television said, citing hospital officials in the city of Hejin, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the mine.

Many survivors were dehydrated as they had refused to drink the water in the pit during their week-long ordeal, fearing contamination, state television said. Doctors also feared gas poisoning from the bad air in the shaft, it said.

At least 3,000 rescuers had been racing against time to pump water out of the mine after it flooded in the latest accident in the notoriously dangerous mining industry.

Rescuers entered the mine over the weekend but said conditions were "complex" and there was more water in the shaft than anticipated.

On Sunday night, a team of 100 rescue workers descended into the mine again and discovered the first nine survivors two hours later, the China News Service said.

As the first team of rescuers exited the mine with the survivors, a second team was dispatched into the pit to search for the remaining missing, the report said. Up to 300 rescuers were in the pit by mid-morning Monday.

The accident occurred when workers apparently dug into an older adjacent mine that had been shut down and filled with water, press reports have said.

The work safety watchdog blamed the accident on lax safety standards by the mine owner, the Huajin Coking Coal Company, which failed to heed repeated warnings that water was accumulating in the pit days before the disaster.

Workers at the half-built mine had also been ordered to step up the pace of work in order to ensure that coal production began by October this year, the safety watchdog said.

Workers' safety is often ignored in China's collieries in the quest for quick profits and the drive to meet surging demand for coal -- the source of about 70 percent of the country's energy.

Last week was a disastrous for China's mining sector. Altogether, nearly 30 people have died and up to 100 are still missing, including in Wangjialing, after five separate coal mining accidents.

According to official statistics, 2,631 coal miners were killed last year in China -- or about seven a day. In the deadliest recent disaster, 172 workers died in a mine flood in the eastern province of Shandong in August 2007.