Four miners remain trapped underground in a coal mine flooding accident in central-south China's Hunan Province, local police said on Thursday.

The accident occurred at around 3 PM Wednesday when 33 miners were working at the Tangshi colliery in Zhuzhou County. Twenty-nine of them managed to escape while four others got trapped.

Rescue work is in progress and the cause of the flooding is being investigated.

Tangshi Colliery is a joint-stock company converted from a state-owned one with an annual production capacity of about 30,000 tons.

(Xinhua News Agency January 13, 2005)