Novoshakhtinsk (Russia), Oct 28: Emergency workers today stopped the flow of water into a flooded mine in southern Russia where 13 miners have been trapped for five days, officials said, as drillers came within meters of the men's presumed location. Rescuers are tunneling through solid rock from an adjacent mine to reach the miners. This morning, the tunnelers were two to three meters (6-10 feet) away from the area where the men are believed to have been stranded by the flood of icy water, said Maj Gen. Viktor Kapkanchikov of Russia's Emergency Situations Ministry.
Andrei Khudyakov, the leader of rescuers at the Zapadnaya mine in Novoshakhtinsk, said his team had plugged the hole through which water had flowed into the shaft. Hundreds of tons of rock, soil and reinforced concrete into the shaft to seal the leak, the Itar-Tass news agency reported.
"Maybe we'll punch through and find them standing there, alive," Khudyakov told reporters.
Bureau Report