An explosion at a coal mine in central Colombia killed nine miners and left six others injured, with provincial and national mining officials describing both the death toll and the rescue efforts after the blast. The incident occurred Monday inside the Carbonera Los Pinos mine in Sutatausa, a municipality in Cundinamarca province about 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Bogota, Cundinamarca Gov. Jorge Emilio Rey said on Tuesday.
Rey said three miners escaped on their own and that the remaining three survivors were rescued. Officials later reported the six injured miners had been recovering in a hospital, while the nine who died were killed in the blast.
Colombia’s National Agency for Mining said in a statement that it had inspected the mine in early April. The agency said officials recommended sealing off parts of the operation that were no longer being used for coal extraction.
The agency said the recommendation was made because of a potentially dangerous “accumulation of gases including methane.” In its statement, the agency did not say whether the mine implemented the recommendation after it was made.
The mining agency expressed solidarity with the victims’ families and said it “regrets this accident in which, thanks to the opportune action of rescue workers, six miners were saved.” It did not provide additional details in the report about the investigation into what caused the explosion.
Mining accidents are common in central Colombia, where dozens of small operators work coal and emerald mines, officials have noted. The region has also seen other deadly blasts in recent years, including an explosion at a coal mine in Sutatausa in 2023 that killed 11 miners, and a separate accident in Cucunuba, also in Cundinamarca province, in 2020 that killed 11 miners.