BEIJING — Barefoot and wrapped in white quilts, 29 miners were pulled out of a Chinese coal mine Monday after being trapped by a flood and waiting a day for rescuers to pump out water.
State broadcaster China Central Television showed medics leading out the miners, naked and with their eyes shielded from the light after 24 hours in darkness. Crowds of mine workers, reporters and others cheered as they were taken to ambulances.
Late Monday, all 29 men were in stable condition at a hospital with no serious injuries, Xinhua reported. They may have removed their clothes because wet clothing would have risked hypothermia.
Some 35 miners were initially trapped Sunday morning when waters from a nearby abandoned mine flooded a shaft in the small, privately owned Batian mine in southwest Sichuan province, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. While 13 managed to escape, another seven entered the mine trying to rescue their colleagues and became trapped, the report said.
The trapped workers found dry space about 125 feet (40 meters) below the surface to wait out the rescue while fast pumping by emergency teams cleared the water away, a mine inspector who took part in the rescue said.
Workers pumped water from the mine for more than 10 hours, Bao said. Rescuers then walked down a slope about 525 feet (160 meters) and along a flat tunnel for another 1,800 feet (550 meters) to reach those trapped, he said.