Vol. 71/No. 14      April 9, 2007

The mine is located near the city of Novokuznetsk in central Siberia's Kuzbass region, which holds some of the largest coal reserves in the world. Deteriorating safety and company-imposed speedup created dangerous conditions leading up to the blast.

According to the ITAR-Tass news agency, this was the deadliest mine accident in the Kuzbass region in 60 years.

The Ulyanovskaya mine, which has been in operation since 2002, is one of the newer, more modern ones in the region. It produces 3 million tons of coal annually. The mine is owned by Yuzhkuzbassugol, a subsidiary of the Evraz metals groups. The company said it plans to have the mine up and running again by the summer.

The explosion occurred after the collapse of the mine's main roof, spreading methane through its inner corridors, reported the Ria Novosti news agency. There were no gas monitors in the area where the methane gas had accumulated, Nikolai Kultyn, an inspector with the federal industrial regulator Rostekhnadzor, told the Associated Press.

It's "imperative to suspend underground coal extraction without the necessary clearing of methane from the mine's surface," Alexander Sergeyev, head of the Independent Trade Union of Russian Miners, told the radio station Ekho Moskvy.

Sergeyev also pointed out that underground miners in Russia, who take home about $575 a month, are dependent on production bonuses for about 60 percent to 70 percent of their pay. "It's the old song: work harder and harder and harder. The more coal you get, the bigger your salary," a retired miner identified only as Nikolai, whose son died at Ulyanovskaya, told Reuters.

Deaths of miners in Russia have been on the rise in recent years. In 2005, 23 were killed by a gas explosion in the Kemerovo region. The year before two separate mine blasts in the area killed 60 miners. In 2006, 84 miners were killed in 21 mine accidents across Russia, which is the world's sixth largest coal producer.

The day after the recent mine blast, a fire at a nursing home for the elderly and disabled in southern Russia killed 62 people. "Many of the dead were confined to their beds and unable to flee the smoke and flames," the New York Times reported. "The alarm system was incomplete," Sergei Salov, a senior emergency official, said on Russian TV. "The personnel did not have equipment to protect against smoke. The bedrooms' wooden panels were not made flame-resistant."

In 2006, 17,065 people died in fires in Russia, an average of nearly 47 a day, according to the Times.  
 
 
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