Ran Mine rescue mission suspended

Lloyd Ndemo

Hopes of finding survivors at Bindura’s collapsed Ran Mine are all but over after authorities suspended the rescue mission on Sunday.

This is the second time search efforts have been suspended in two weeks.

Six trapped miners had emerged alive from the mine, about 70km north of the capital Harare.

The mine collapse comes weeks after six miners died in Esigodini, southern Zimbabwe, while five others died in Chegutu when the mines collapsed.

Department of Civil Protection director, Nathan Nkomo said, “Our team is on the ground, but for now, we have stopped the dewatering exercise because the point we were doing the dewatering collapsed on Saturday to an extent of even burying one of the water pumps used by the Chinese who had come to assist us.

“Again, there are some big cracks developing around the area which shows that the previous blast left the whole area fractured, so we met yesterday to chat the way forward after realising that dewatering which we thought would give us part of the solution is no longer possible and the engineers from the ministry of mines are currently working out a new approach. ”