The Sunday Mail
Fungai Lupande
Mashonaland Central Bureau
AN attempt by artisanal miners at Ran Mine to supplant a central mineshaft pillar using an explosive, hours before the tragic mine collapse, triggered a chain of events that led to the death of dozens of fortune-seekers underground.
An eyewitness account details how an explosive was deployed to dislodge the mine support structure, following an overnight attempt to manually dig out the pillar.
The Sunday Mail pieced together, through a witness and survivor’s account, the final moments before the tunnel collapsed, trapping scores of miners underground.
Ten miners are believed to be trapped underground since the mine caved in on November 25, with hopes of finding them alive fading fast.
Two people died in the incident, one of them while assisting with rescue efforts.
Slogo Maga (43), who miraculously survived the incident, said signs of an impending disaster became apparent when a group of miners started digging out the foundations of a pillar holding the mineshaft together the night before the disaster.
He said over 40 miners were working in the tunnel on the fateful day.
Having failed to dislodge the pillar, a plan to use explosives to weaken the edifice was hatched.
“People were trying to dig out the pillar, which was holding the mineshaft, and they failed,” said Maga.
“The following morning at around 9am, a group of miners decided to blast the pillar using explosives. This caused the pillar to shake violently.
“Everyone then stopped working and we went outside where we waited for about 45 minutes to observe if anything amiss would happen.”
An hour passed with the tunnel seemingly intact, and the miners assumed that it was safe to return underground.
Hours passed while the miners continued with their drudgery, before any sign of structural weakness to the tunnel was noticed.
“At around 3pm someone inside shouted that the pillar had shaken.”
Within seconds, the roof collapsed.
“The roof collapsed onto the underground water forcing it to rise and flood the tunnel. We were trapped under the water and could not breathe.”
The panic-stricken miners quickly took to their heels towards the fast-closing shaft exit. A second collapse of the roof closed the exit.
“People were crowded at the exit. A third movement of the tunnel’s roof created a small opening at the exit point and people jostled to get out. I let my team members out first before I wiggled myself out from between rocks.
“I tried to help a colleague who had broken his legs, but he told me to leave him behind because the opening was too small.
He said he did not panic when he came face-to-face with death, because he “knew that I would survive”.
Brian Ben (30), who lives at the Ran Mine compound, said he was alerted to the disaster by his wife after she heard a loud noise from the mine.
“I rushed to the scene where, along with others, we used ropes to remove one miner whose legs were broken.
“Some miners returned underground to try to help their colleagues before the police arrived, but could not locate them.”
The night before
There was a festive atmosphere at Ran Mine on the eve of the disaster. After all, there was reason to be happy — Ran Mine was a gold mine, literally and figuratively. Individual miners were getting up to 20 grammes of gold ore, according to Maga.
This particular tunnel was offering handsome rewards.
A short video recording taken the evening before the mine gave in, shows a group of artisanal miners preparing to plunge into a disused mineshaft.
The video shows an army of half-naked men immersed, up to their midriffs, in water and armed with all manner of artisanal mining tools, preparing to go underground.
Some are seen indiscriminately chiselling at large rocks with half their bodies under water.
One of them took a dive under water before emerging with a handful of rocks much to the delight of his colleagues.
All this takes place amid a festive atmosphere, with the miners chiding each other about their extravagant lifestyles.
“My team had four people and we were working at the furthest part of the tunnel,” said Maga.
“A lot of people worked in that tunnel because it was paying handsomely. One could get between 11 to 20 grammes from a small sack of gold ore.”
He said the need to raise money for the forthcoming holiday festivities meant that unorthodox means were being used to get the ore.
Rescue mission
A rescue team comprising the district civil protection team and Ministry of Mines and Mining Development officials deployed to the accident scene was confronted by the ominous task of de-watering the tunnel, which had flooded.
A malfunctioning generator which was being used to power the water pump hampered efforts to drain the 100-metre deep mine.
Six miners were, however, rescued and taken to hospital within hours of the rescue team’s arrival, after which efforts to rescue more were affected by heavy rains and groundwater flooding.
On Monday, rescuers and volunteers pulled the body of Edmore Tsongodza from the rubble.
Wellington House, a volunteer, died after being hit by a boulder. He fell into the tunnel.
His body was recovered last Sunday.
Both men have since been buried.
Hope fading for trapped miners
the official rescue party and volunteers pour over the collapsed mine shaft at Ran Mine last week
Desperate families of miners who remain trapped underground have turned to local traditional leaders and spirit mediums for guidance and assistance.
Mrs Melodious Katoratsoko from Gora Village in Madziwa under Chief Nyamaropa, whose son Alexio Felix Nyamvura (29) is believed to be among the trapped miners said all hope of finding him alive was lost.
“I don’t believe that my son is still alive,” she said.
“All I want to see is his body and take it home for proper burial. If those trapped are not retrieved, their spirits will not rest in peace. The flooding in the tunnel only began to subside after we conducted some traditional rituals.”
She said spirit mediums had advised against allowing females near the scene, advice which was ignored by rescue authorities.
“The spirit mediums also said no one should go close to the tunnel because there is a lot of gold inside,” she added.
“We were told that people who enter into the mine must not touch the gold and we were also told that those who retrieve the bodies will require cleansing. We want an opportunity to follow the traditional processes.
“Artisanal miners are different from registered miners and they help each other. We might spend two months here to no avail.”
A disaster waiting to happen
The mine was decommissioned 20 years ago, but locals continued to extract residual gold.
Mine director, Mr Richard Chiwandire, said: “For a long time this has been a tragedy in the making. Efforts to prevent this have been ongoing with the involvement of all the relevant Government authorities.
“Strategies to deal with the problem in the future will continue to be worked on in conjunction with the Government.”
Accidents are relatively common in decommissioned mines, particularly when the ground is loosened by downpours.
Twenty-four miners died at Battlefields in Kadoma last year when the shaft they were working in was flooded following heavy rains.
