This Tuesday, nine miners working for the mining company Anagold Mining disappeared in eastern Turkey after the slide of large amounts of earth mixed with cyanide and sulfuric acid. The incident that occurred at the Ilic Copler gold mine is being investigated by authorities while rescue efforts for the miners continue, according to the Ministry of the Interior. This mine had already been involved in incidents that caused its temporary closure in 2020.
First modification:
4 min
These are the images of the landslide at the Copler mine, located near the city of Ilic in the mountainous province of Erzincan in Turkey, which left nine miners missing.
Erzincan'ın İliç ilçesindeki Anagold Altın Madeni'nde göçük meydana geldi. Siyanür ve sülfürik asit dağları çöktü. Çok sayıda işçinin göçük altında kaldığı belirtiliyor. pic.twitter.com/yo7Z1gSh4y
—Politic Türk (@politicturk) February 13, 2024
The video apparently recorded by a mine worker was published by the local media 'Politk Türk'.
The events occurred during a mining operation carried out by Anagold Mining, a major Turkish mining company. Anagold Mining has operated the Copler mine since 2009 and estimates that 667 people work there.
The Turkish company reported in a statement that its “most important priority in this difficult process is the health and safety of its employees and contractors.”
“This is a painful situation. “Immediately after the incident, we contacted our employees in the region, put our emergency plan in place and informed the relevant public institutions and organizations,” the statement said.
Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said 400 search and rescue personnel are working at the scene. In turn, the Turkish emergency agency AFAD added that personnel from surrounding provinces were mobilized to the mine to participate in the rescue efforts.
The Interior Minister added that while nothing is yet known about the missing miners, “they are believed to be buried underground.”
For his part, Yilmaz Tunc, Minister of Justice, announced the start of an investigation into the disaster that was confirmed to have been caused by a mound of earth extracted from the mine.
“I wish our citizens of Erzincan a speedy recovery and hope that our mining brothers who are trapped under the rubble will be rescued safely,” Tunc added.
The Turkish government banned the dissemination of multimedia content dealing with the incident until the facts are clarified.
Environmental threat due to incident at the Copler mine
The Copler mine had closed in 2020 after a cyanide leak into the important Euphrates River, which runs through Turkey, Syria and Iraq. However, it reopened in 2022 after the company Anagold Mining paid a fine and completed a cleanup operation.
Now, the same mine is once again involved in another environmental incident. The landslide that caused the disappearance of nine workers contains sulfuric acid and cyanide. These amounts of land slid down streams leading to the Euphrates River.
The environmental threat of the incident was confirmed by geologist Suleyman Pampal, who told the Turkish newspaper 'Habertürk' that the soil that formed the landslide had been processed for gold and may contain dangerous substances such as cyanide. Suleyman warned that the threat is due to the mine's proximity to the Euphrates River.
“Mixing with the Euphrates means the end of all life. “We must urgently prevent it from reaching the Euphrates.”
The Ministry of the Environment reported in a statement that one of the streams leading to the Euphrates was closed to prevent water contamination.
However, the environmental threat was denied by local authorities. The governor of Erzincan, Hamza Aydogdu, assured that no cyanide had entered any stream leading to the Euphrates.
“At the moment there is no leak. If there was, we would say so. There are no leaks into the Euphrates River. There was a landslide, so there is no problem other than this landslide,” the governor said.
Copler Mine Landslide: Preventable Incident?
Türkiye has a poor track record on mining safety. In 2022, an explosion at the Amasra coal mine on the Black Sea coast killed 41 workers.
The country's worst mining disaster took place in 2014 at a coal mine in Soma, western Turkey, where 301 people died.
In the wake of those incidents, engineers warned that safety risks were often ignored and inspections were not carried out properly.
“The disaster that took place at the Erzincan Ilic Copler gold mine is a disaster that was yet to come,” the Union of Chambers of Engineers and Architects of Turkey said in a statement posted on social media.
The union added that it had filed two lawsuits against the mine's operation.
With AP, Reuters and local media
#miners #disappeared #Türkiye #landslide
