Twelve women working at an illegal gold mine in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province have been killed by a landslide that has caused them to be crushed by mud, police said.
Many makeshift mines exist in Indonesia, which is rich in precious metal deposits, and residents often search abandoned mines for traces of gold without proper protection equipment.
The accident took place yesterday, Thursday, in the Mandaling Natal area and the 12 women who lost their lives were between 30 and 50 years old and were looking for gold in an abandoned illegal gold mine.
“Twelve women were crushed by a landslide (caused) on a slope and all were killed,” local police chief Marlon Rajagukguk told AFP last night, adding that the victims were not professional miners.
Two women who worked with them managed to escape and ran to a nearby village to alert the authorities.
Rescuers worked for hours to retrieve the bodies, which were in a two-meter-deep hole full of mud.
“The bodies of the women have been handed over to their families,” the official said.
There are a large number of mines in this area, located about 300 km from the capital Medan in the province of North Sumatra and in which many mines have been abandoned by their owners.
Landslides are common in the archipelago in Southeast Asia and are a common occurrence during the rainy season.
Last year, six miners were killed in the collapse of an old illegal mine in Pariji Mutong on the island of Sulawesi.
In 2020, eleven mine workers in Sumatra were killed by a landslide caused by heavy rainfall.
SOURCE: ΑΠΕ-ΜΠΕ
Source: Capital
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