Impacts: 4
Unauthorized mines, which circumvent basic security measures, are common in the mineral-rich Southeast Asian archipelago, where accidents are frequent.
Miners were digging inside a 60-meter-deep shaft in the central Java village of Pancurandang on Tuesday night when water suddenly flooded the mine, police said.
“We received a report this morning that eight people were trapped inside a mine, we are currently trying to pump water to rescue the miners,” local police chief Edy Suranta Sitepu said.
The workers entered the mine at 8:00 p.m. (1300 GMT) on Tuesday and have been trapped there ever since, he said.
“We do not know their current condition, we pray that they can be evacuated safely,” added Sitepu, while specifying that it was an unauthorized mine.
Divers will be dispatched if attempts to evacuate the water from the mine fail, Amin Riyanto, coordinator of the search and rescue team, told reporters.
In 2021, six people died in the collapse of an illegal gold mine on the island of Sulawesi.
At least 16 people died two years earlier when another illegal gold mine on the island collapsed, engulfing workers.