THE BODIES of all four miners buried in a Nováky mine last Thursday remain some 200 meters underground. Over the weekend, rescuers only managed to find fragments of the bodies.
The rescue search operation showed that the landslide inside the mine was so strong that the miners had no space at all to hide from the mud, which also destroyed heavy mining machinery, Sme wrote.
The rescue work was complicated by the threat of further landslides that could have endangered the rescue team as well.
Seven miners managed to escape the landslide. At the time of the tragedy, they were further away from the landslide epicenter. According to mine managers the landslide was caused by an “anomalous phenomenon”, an unusual mine rupture that created a huge 11 meter-wide and 30 meter- deep crater on the surface of the mine.
All four dead miners were married and were fathers. The management of the Hornonitrianske bane mining company have visited the families of all the dead miners and provided them with psychological and medical assistance.
