Lily Mine emergency escape route complete
Management at Lily mine in Mpumalanga says teams have finished drilling an emergency escape route.
Three workers remain underground following a collapse at the Barberton mine nearly a month ago.
Spokesperson Coetzee Zietsman explains what will happen next.
"What we are busy doing now is sending very small teams of experts down the line to assess the situation. From that assessment, they will draw up a report - and once we have that report we will be able to analyse it and see what the best way forward will be.
"It's a very complex situation because as you can understand - with that amount of earth that fell into that hole there are stability issues ," he said.
Zietsman says the families of the trapped miners are still camped at the grounds of the mine.
He says they all have to be realistic about the workers' chances for survival.
"We as department of mineral resources and union are in constant contact with them and keeping them abreast of the situation. Until we can send a rescue worker into that mine, so that they continue the processes and we have absolute understanding of what's going on there. It's difficult to say. This will remain a search and rescue operation," he said.
(Thumbnail photo: Gallo Images, photos: Jacaranda News)