7 presumed dead in flooded mine

A week-long rescue was halted at a flooded coal mine in eastern China Tuesday night as rescuers saw no chance of any of the seven trapped miners surviving.

The flood in a mine shaft in the rural outskirts of Yichun city, Jiangxi Province, started on Nov. 23. Rescuers had been pumping water from the mine in hope of reaching the miners trapped underground.

Fourteen were saved but seven remain unaccounted for.

Chen Zhijun, a local district government official, said the miners were trapped too deep underground. Even if there were air in the shaft, the underwater pressure would exceed the limits of the human body, he said

Rescuers said they pumped out water three times the volume of the flooded space, but water levels did not subside that much due to the large supply of underground water .

The operation was called off to avoid triggering further geological disasters, rescuers said. Endi