Putin demands efficient organization of rescue works at Rostov region mine

Russian President Vladimir Putin demands that the Rostov region (South Federal District) authorities and rescuers efficiently organize rescue works at the Zapadnaya-Kapitalnaya mine. Forty-six miners were trapped at a depth of 800 meters after underground waters broke through on Thursday night.

The Russian President was immediately informed of the emergency at the mine, the Kremlin press service reports.

The head of state has several times spoken over the phone to Rostov region governor Vladimir Chub, Russian Emergencies Ministry Sergei Shoigu, Energy Minister Igor Yusufov and Lev Troyanovsky, head of the Rostovugol company, who provided information on the rescue works.

Vladimir Putin paid special heed to the necessity of well-defined organization of rescue works, the Kremlin press service said.

Seventy-one people were inside of the Zapadnaya-Kapitalnaya mine at the moment of the emergency. Twenty-five managed to get to the surface a few minutes after, representatives of the commission established to look into the accident told a Rostov press conference. They said the reason for the accident was a breakthrough of an underground lake situated under the mine. The volume of water in that lake amounts to some 28 million cubic meters.