Fire breaks out in coal mine in Kemerovo region, miners being evacuated
KEMEROVO. March 28 (Interfax) - A fire broke out on a beltway in the Alardinskaya coal mine affiliated with the Yuzhkuzbassugol United Coal Company in the Kemerovo region on Thursday, the Emergency Situations Ministry department for the Kemerovo region told Interfax.
There were a total of 528 miners underground at the moment of the incident, and 510 of them have already been evacuated, it said.
The evacuation is continuing, and preliminary reports indicate that no one was harmed.
Several teams of various emergency and rescue services are currently working at the scene, and an emergency medical team is ready to join the effort.
It was reported earlier that a local court had suspended some of the work in the Alardinskaya mine due to irregularities uncovered by inspectors from a local department of the Russian technical standards watchdog Rostekhnadzor.
For example, violations were uncovered in the development gallery of belt entry 3-39; particularly, there was insufficient ventilation there, which led to excessive gas concentrations on March 9.
The inspectors also uncovered violations in the operation of the beltway and a poor level of production control.
The Kaltan District Court ruled to suspend belt entry 3-39's operations for 30 days.
Yuzhkuzbassugol is comprised of the Abashevskaya, Alardinskaya, Gramoteinskaya, Yesaulskaya, Erunakovskaya-8 (under construction), Kuzheyakovskaya, Osinnikovskaya, Tomskaya, and Uskovskaya (known before July 2012 as Yubileynaya) mines.