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Some 240 miners trapped underground amid power outage at Ukraine Lugansk region's mine

According to the head of the Independent Trade Union of Miners of Ukraine, electricity is supplied only to the amounts enough to ventilate the mines and pump out water

KIEV, April 2. /TASS/. Ukraine’s electricity company has cut off electricity to mines of Pervomaiskugol state-run enterprise on the Kiev-controlled territory of the Lugansk region, grounding mine shaft elevators. A total of 240 miners remain trapped underground, the head of the Independent Trade Union of Miners of Ukraine, Mikhail Volynets, said on Monday.

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"Today, on April 2, the state electricity company Regionalnye Electricheskiye Seti left without power all mines of the Pervomaiskugol state-run enterprise in the Lugansk region," he wrote on his Facebook page. "The situation is critical, even mine shaft elevators are not functioning. Meanwhile, 240 miners remain underground, at a depth of more than 1,000 meters," he said.

According to Volynets, electricity is supplied only to the amounts enough to ventilate the mines and pump out water. An emergency evacuation plan envisages the miners’ getting to the ground through an emergency exit, climbing the stairs in the southern mine shaft".

This is not the first incident in Ukraine when organizations supplying electricity cut off electricity to coalmines with miners stranded underground.

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