Seventy-two Canadian miners trapped underground for more than 24-hours have been rescued.
Source:
SBS
31 Jan 2006 - 12:00 AM  UPDATED 22 Aug 2013 - 12:18 PM

The miners were forced to take refuge in special underground safety rooms in the potash mine in the western province of Saskatchewan, on Sunday after smoke poured through the mine's shafts following a fire.

"All 72 of our miners are now safely on surface and are completely healthy," Mosaic Company mine spokesman, Marshall Hamilton, said.

The rescued men were tired and had been worried by the length of their ordeal, the spokesman told a press conference.

The fire broke out early on Sunday in a polyethylene pipe at the mine near Esterhazy, east of Regina. The miners had been trapped about one kilometer below the surface.

The workers took shelter in the mine's refuge stations, which can be sealed off and contain oxygen and food supplies.

Potash, which is used in fertilisers, is very difficult to set alight.

But rescuers had trouble putting out the fire in the polyethylene pipe and could not go down until safety managers were certain that all toxic fumes had been stopped, Mr Hamilton said.

One group of 32 miners was brought up in the early hours of Monday. Thirty five in a second group followed shortly after, while the final five came up on Monday morning. No serious injuries were reported.

"It's just a huge mine," said the spokesman, stressing the 20 kilometre by 30 kilometre area.

Once the polyethylene pipe catches fire, it "will continue to burn along the length of the pipe, a little bit like a wick and so we had to find a way to break that wick and stop the flames and the smoke.

"And we were successful and that's what's caused the ability to go in and get our workers," said the spokesman for US mine.

Mine safety is a controversial topic in North America. Twelve men were killed on January 2 in a fire at coal mine in Tallmansville, in the US state of West Virginia.

Two more miners died in another fire in the state three weeks later, leading for calls for improved safety measures.

The Saskatchewan mine has been open since 1962 and the province provides about 30 percent of world demand for potash.

Mosaic CEO Fritz Corrigan promised a thorough investigation into the cause of the fire.

Mosaic is one of the world's biggest industrial fertiliser companies and employs about 8,000 people.