Authorities in Mexico assured this Friday that there are "conditions" to enter the mine in the north of the country where 10 workers were trapped nine days ago by a flood.
"We have all the conditions to go down today (…) to the search and rescue" of the miners, said the national coordinator of Civil Protection, Laura Velázquez, during the morning conference of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Velázquez explained that the operation will be possible thanks to the fact that "97% water extraction" that flooded the coal mine in the town of Agujita (state of Coahuila, north).
"The necessary resources are prepared to initiate search and rescue efforts."he insisted.
The water level is 70 centimeters in one of the three wells through which an attempt will be made to enter, compared to 30 meters that existed a day after the accident, the Secretary of National Defense, Luis Cresencio Sandoval, explained at the same conference.
In the other two wells, the level is 3.9 and 4.7 meters, added the military command. The level that the authorities consider optimal for access is 1.5 meters.
"We are going to continue pumping anyway, the pumping is not going to stop. Some pumps are going to be replaced (with smaller ones). It’s a slow process, but we don’t want to take any chances."indicated the coordinator of Civil Protection.
The accident occurred on August 3 when a wall of a flooded and abandoned mine collapsed, causing the flooding of the shaft where 15 miners were maneuvering. Five of them managed to escape.
Since then there have been no signs of life of the 10 remaining workers, whose rescue involves several hundred people including soldiers, Civil Protection officials and volunteer miners.
