No Response From Miners Yet From 2nd Utah Hole

Rescuers using a second hole drilled into a collapsed Utah coal mine so far have not established communication with six trapped miners.

Six trapped coal miners failed to respond to rescuers pounding on a second drill that has pierced a collapsed mine, and water pouring through the drill hole foiled a first attempt to use a camera to see the space, rescue officials said on Saturday.

Rescuers next plan to insert a lining into the new drill hole, which will take many hours but would protect the camera and let it send back good images, they said.

The miners have not been heard from since Monday, when part of the Crandall Canyon Mine near Huntington, Utah, collapsed.

There is potable water and a "survivable space" where the second, nearly 9-inch (20-cm), drill punched through the mine ceiling, U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration chief Richard Stickler said at a news conference.

Rescuers hope the reinserted camera will be able to scan 100 feet (30 metres) in each direction and provide better details of the conditions underground.

A first, 2-1/2-inch (6-cm) drill pierced into another area of the mine late on Thursday but there was no sign of life when a two-way microphone was lowered into the mine.

Rescuers said survey equipment later showed the first drill had "drifted" some 85 feet (26 metres) as it made its way down from the surface and may not have pierced the cavity where the men were thought to be stranded.

Tests taken with instruments fed through the first hole showed that the oxygen levels in the chamber were too low to sustain life, although no other toxic gases were detected.

DAYS OF DIGGING

It will take crews digging horizontally four to five days to create an opening large enough to pull the miners out. The larger drill hole can be used to provide food, water and air until they are rescued.

Officials have said the men could potentially survive for weeks in an underground chamber if they had not been killed by the initial collapse.

Mine co-owner Robert Murray told the news conference the horizontal digging was slow because the mine's roof needed to be shored up frequently to prevent another collapse. He has insisted that an earthquake triggered the first collapse but geologists say the shaking recorded by their instruments was caused by the cave-in.

Controversy has also risen over reports that the miners were engaged in dangerous "retreat mining" when the shaft collapsed; Murray has denied such a technique was being used.

Retreat mining involves supporting a mine's roof with a column of coal, then removing those pillars and allowing the shaft to collapse as miners move to safety.

The Crandall Canyon Mine is on a high desert plateau some 140 miles (225 km) south of Salt Lake City, in what is known as Utah's "castle country" because of the towering rock spires that dot the bleak landscape.