Beijing: Nine people were killed in coal mine gas explosion in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, local authorities said Thursday.
The explosion occurred on Wednesday afternoon at the Yuchen coal mine in Jidong County, the county government said.
At the time of the blast, 17 miners were working underground. Of them, eight were rescued and rushed to hospital. They are in stable conditions, (Xinhua) news agency reported.
Bodies of the rest nine miners have been lifted to the ground.
An investigation into the cause of the explosion is under way.
In another context, nine workers were trapped when a railway tunnel under construction collapsed on Thursday morning, the Chinese authorities said.
The tunnel entrance in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture collapsed in the morning, the information office of the prefecture government said in a statement.
A rescue operation is under way, it added.
