A week after becoming trapped in a flooded Mexican coal mine, 10 miners are still awaiting rescue, Mexico’s defence ministry said on Thursday.
On August 3, a tunnel wall collapsed due to excavation work. The resulting flooding in the mine deep underground caused the working to become trapped.
A team of army divers were thwarted in their first attempt to reach the miners at the bottom of the mine in northern Mexico, the New York Post reported.
On Thursday, officials said they had worked to lower water levels in the mine that had grown to 100 feet. But it was still not safe to send in rescue crews. On Wednesday, two military divers swam through flooded mine shafts to clear debris but were not able to enter the mine itself.
“There is no space to move forward, there are obstructions … there are still some planks of wood. Even with their lights to see inside, they don’t have the necessary visibility to identify what they’re finding,” Defense Minister Luis Cresencio told reporters.
Mexico’s Attorney General’s office said on Thursday that it was ordering a judicial hearing in Coahuila to examine whether the mine’s owner was responsible for “illicit exploitation” of a state asset, alleging he “[failed] to comply with the law’s obligations” for a coal mine.