China Coal-Mine Fire Kills 26 Workers – by Chun Han Wong (Wall Street Journal – November 26, 2014)

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Mine Operated by a Unit of State-Owned Fuxin Coal in Liaoning Province

BEIJING—A coal-mine fire in northeastern China killed 26 workers and left 50 others injured on Wednesday, state media said, in one of the worst accidents so far this year in the country’s accident-prone mining industry.

The predawn fire occurred in Liaoning province, at a mine operated by a subsidiary of the state-owned Fuxin Coal Corp., the official Xinhua News Agency said.

The report cited a hospital manager as saying 30 of the injured workers were in serious condition, including four with life-threatening injuries. Hengda Coal, the Fuxin subsidiary that operates the mine, has halted all work at its facilities to conduct safety checks, Xinhua said.

Local authorities were investigating whether the accident was related to a 1.6-magnitude earthquake that hit the area about an hour before the fire broke out, the agency said.

China is the world’s largest coal producer and consumer, but its more than 12,000 mines are notoriously deadly.

Some 1,049 people were killed or missing in coal-mining accidents in China last year, compared with 52 deaths over the last decade in U.S. coal-mining disasters, according to data from Chinese and U.S. authorities.

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