Families of the 29 miners, including two Queenslanders, killed in the Pike River mine are relieved the New Zealand government is stumping up more than $NZ7 million ($A6.16 million) for a partial re-entry of the mine, but Prime Minister John Key played down the chances of recovering the men's bodies.
The NZ government has approved a plan to re-enter the West Coast underground mine, where the bodies of the 29 men have been trapped since a series of explosions ripped through it in November 2010.
Work will start in October and re-entry may be possible by the middle of next year.
The plan is to go about 2km into the drift to the point where it collapsed, but the bodies are believed to be further in, in the main part of the mine.
The cabinet on Tuesday announced it had approved conditional funding of $NZ7.2m of a staged plan to re-enter and explore the drift leading up to the rock fall.
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Victims' families spokesman Bernie Monk said that when the families were given the news in Greymouth on Tuesday, there were smiles on faces that hadn't been there for a long time.
The families always knew the drift could be re-entered, and since the government had come on board, things had happened quickly in seven months since the receivership and bankruptcy proceedings had been completed, he told AAP.
It was a "big possibility" bodies could eventually be recovered.
The families only wanted one opportunity to get to the rockfall and the experts would evaluate what could be done from there.
"If they see it's doable, I am sure the government will certainly make the funds available."
But Mr Key believes it will be too dangerous to enter the main body of the mine.
It was "very unlikely" a high hazard unit would want to go into the main body of the mine, given the dangers there, including flooding, fire and explosions, he told reporters in the Marshall Islands, where he is attending the Pacific Islands Forum.
The government was spending the money to seal the ventilation shaft - which needed to be done anyway - gather more evidence for investigators, and see if there were any bodies on the drift side of the rock fall.
When asked if the government would pay any more to go deeper into the mine, Mr Key said that would become clear once they reached the rockfall.
However, he was not convinced it would be safe to go further.
"Of everything we've seen, either moving the rockfall or ultimately getting into the mine would be a Herculean step, and I just don't think that's likely to happen."
However, the main body of the mine could be re-entered if someone was able to start mining the coal again, he said. There is an estimated $NZ6.5 billion worth of coal in the Pike River seam.
Debt-ridden state-owned coalminer Solid Energy has bought the mine, but doesn't have the cash to re-open it.
