CARLETONVILLE, South Africa - Some 3,000 gold miners were trapped deep underground Wednesday when a burst water pipe apparently damaged the elevator shaft, but the company expected to get them out safely in the next 24 hours, officials said.
There were no reports of injuries at Harmony Gold Mining Co.'s Elandsrand Mine outside Carletonville, near Johannesburg.
Harmony's acting chief executive, Graham Briggs, told MSNBC television that managers were in contact with the trapped workers and lowered food and water to them.
Peter Bailey, a union leader, said the miners were hungry and thirsty and had been underground for hours, some for nearly a day. He described them as fearful and said they were crowded together at an emergency assembly point.
'Some of these mineworkers started duty on Tuesday evening. It is now Wednesday night and they are still underground,' Bailey said at the scene.
Briggs said rescuers would evacuate the miners using a small cage to raise them up another shaft, but he stressed the process would be a slow one. 'It's a case of getting a large number of people up in cages,' he said.
Briggs said the workers - the entire morning shift - became trapped after damage to the elevator shaft made it unsafe to use.
'Nobody was injured, but there was extensive damage to the steel work and electrical feeder cords,' said Harmony Gold spokeswoman Amelia Soares, adding that some miners were heading to shafts in an adjacent mine, owned by AngloAshanti.
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