Sixty-two miners have been confirmed dead and 13 missing after a colliery gas blast in Tangshan City in north China's Hebei Province on Wednesday.

According to Xinhua News Agency today, rescuers were still searching for those trapped at Liuguantun Coal Mine in Kaiping District.

The report said 186 miners were working underground at around 3:30 PM yesterday, the time of the explosion, and that 82 managed to escape it.

Accident workers recovered 59 bodies and rescued a further 32, three of whom died later despite emergency medical treatment.

Vice provincial governor Fu Shuangjian and senior officials from industrial safety regulators rushed to the site to direct rescue operations and organize an investigation into the accident.

Li Yizhong, director of the State Administration of Work Safety, and Zhao Tiechui, director of the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, left Beijing for Tangshan yesterday evening.

The mine used to be state-owned, run by the local government with a designated production capacity of 300,000 tons per year. In 2002, it was privatized and allocated an annual capacity of 150,000 tons.

A provincial administration of coal mine safety report categorized it as a "low-gas" colliery.

(Xinhua News Agency December 8, 2005)