Musukwa Gold Mining company has urged the government to get assistance from foreign countries that have proper machinery and equipment to assist in the removal of trapped Seseli miners.
Recently miners at Seseli Mine in Chingola were trapped of which so far, only 11 bodies with one survivor have been retrieved bringing the total number of retrieved miners to 12. The rescue mission which includes military personnel and others from large-scale mining companies have continued to search for the miners whose number still remains unclear.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times – ZBT, Musukwa Gold Mining Director Ephraim Musukwa lamented that the government has taken time to retrieve the miners due to lack of proper equipment.
Musukwa suggested that the best way to remove the remaining trapped miners is to pump out water from the mine, open it and use escavators to remove the collapsed materials.
He observed that what is currently being done by rescuers is that they are going underground manually to search for the miners which might slow the process.
He added that surviving underground depends on the metres at which miners are trapped, the number of people trapped and the size of the tunnel adding that if someone is alone, it is possible for them to survive as opposed to when there are many due to insufficient oxygen.
“The Government can talk to countries like South Africa who are established in gold mining and have a mine and equipment which can go as far as 500 meters underground to assist in the removal of miners. The government has taken time to retrieve the trapped miners because as a country we don’t have equipment. We are different from other countries in that for us we don’t have proper machinery. To remove the trapped miners they have to pump out water and use an escavator to open it but it’s like the commando’s are going down manually to go and get those guys. When underground mining collapses, the best way is to open the mine by removing the collapsed things which might be expensive but KCM and Mopani mine can do that but it will take time because maybe the miners are 100 meters and for the escavator to reach that far, it will take weeks or months,” he said.
“According to the experience that I have Surviving underground depends on the metres and the number of people who are trapped and the size of the tunnel because if someone is alone on 60 or 80 metres he or she can stay for days but if they are many they can’t survive on 60 metres because they are sharing
the same oxygen for a long time. I think that the miner who survived the Seseli mining accident was situated where the water wasn’t much because when you go underground you can make ways where you sleep so maybe he was sleeping on top where the water was not much that’s how I think he managed to survive,” said Musukwa.
Musukwa therefore emphasized on the importance of small scale miners having mining experiences to prevent mining accidents.
“Most miners do not have experience to do underground mining especially the guys in Chingola as compared to miners in gold mining. As miners in gold mining we have a little bit of experience because of Tanzanians who taught us how to shutter the pits using timber so that nothing can collapse on us,” said Musukwa.
