Continuous heavy rains and cave-in caused by the rain hampered the efforts to search for 11 miners who had been trapped for 30 days in a copper mine in Yangxin County of Hubei Province, rescuers said Thursday.

On June 16, the copper mine under the Pengling Mining Group Company in Baisha Town, Yangxin County, was suddenly flooded, trapping 11 miners working 345 meters underground.

The high water level in the shaft was the major factor that blocked rescue efforts, said Ke Meiyin, an official with Yangxin County People's Congress.

As Hubei has entered the rainy season since mid-June, heavy rain and rainstorms have time and again hit the area where the flooded copper mine is located, causing the surface water to spread through the flooded mine, hindering the rescue work.

Pumps have been working round the clock to pump out water from the copper mine, but the water level in the shaft had just dropped from 18 meters under the surface to about 100 meter beneath, still more than 200 meters from the site where the miners are trapped, Ke said.

Moreover, continuous rains and the high water level in the shaft led to cave-ins in the major and slant shafts of the copper mine, adding difficulties to the rescue efforts, the official said.

However, Ke said, "We'll keep trying our best to rescue the trapped miners."

Source: Xinhua