29 Dead at New Zealand Mine

       All 29 miners trapped underground in a New Zealand mine are dead, the official in charge of a the rescue attempt said Wednesday on the country's South Island after a five-day rescue effort failed. During the rescue attempt, air released from drilling into the mine contained high levels of carbon monoxide and methane but little oxygen, according to police officials.
       The tragedy represents New Zealand's worst mining accident in the last 100 years and is likely to be followed by an in-depth government-led inquiry into its causes and safety across the industry. The disaster comes as a blow to a local community that depended upon the mine for jobs and income, with many families in the area affected.
       The 29 men, ages 17 to 62, had been missing since Friday, when an explosion ripped through the Greymouth mine. Most of the miners are from New Zealand, but the group also includes Scotlanders and South Africans.
       The missing men are believed to have been spread throughout the mine, with perhaps half trapped in one area.Whittall and Knowles reiterated that potentially explosive gases in the collapsed mine have rendered a rescue attempt unsafe so far.
       "It's just too dangerous. You can't put the lives of the guys going underground at risk," Whittall said.
Late Tuesday, officials showed family members and reporters a closed-circuit television video of the mine's entrance during Friday's blast. The minute-long video shows dust flying and a white screen flapping back and forth before it is blown out of the tunnel.
The video "showed that the blast was quite large and went on for a long time," Whittall said.

He said that the "sobering" video showed a site at least 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles) away from the blast. Officials decided to play it for family members and reporters to illustrate "how dangerous it would be to re-enter the mine," he said.