KEMEROVO, February 14 (RIA Novosti) - Two rescue workers were killed on Saturday in an explosion at a coal mine in southwest Siberia, an official from the Kemerovo region administration said.
A team of rescue workers descended in the Voroshilov mine in the town of Prokopyevsk in the the Kuznetsk coal basin, or Kuzbass, to investigate the cause of a high concentration of carbon monoxide underground.
"The accident occurred at about 10:14 a.m. Moscow time (07:30 GMT) on Saturday, after 172 mine workers were evacuated from the mine following a gas leak warning," the official said.
The work at the mine has been suspended until the end of an investigation into the accident.
The Voroshilov mine and other mines in Kuzbass have recently underwent safety inspections following a minor methane gas blast at the Voroshilov mine last June, when seven miners received burns of varying degrees.
