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BEIJING - A gas explosion in a coal mine in southern China killed 48 workers and injured two others Friday, the state-run Xinhua News Agency said.
The blast occurred at 11:45 a.m. in the Jianxin Coal Mine in Jiangxi province, Xinhua said. The cause was under investigation, it said.
It was not immediately clear how many miners were working when the explosion occurred, but 48 bodies have been recovered, Xinhua said.
Gangs of 50 to 60 people worked in shifts throughout the day pulling out bodies from the explosion site. Li Chengmin, deputy chief engineer of the Tonghua Coal Mine Bureau, said the explosion caused many cave-ins, which were hampering rescue efforts.
A woman who answered the telephone at the Fengcheng Coal Mine Bureau, which oversees the state-run Jianxin mine, said she did not have an exact figure of how many people were underground.
The mine, which has an annual capacity of 600,000 tons, has stopped operations, Xinhua said.
China's coal mines are the deadliest in the world. More than 4,100 deaths have been reported so far this year in explosions, floods and cave-ins.
Lax safety rules and a lack of fire and ventilation equipment often are blamed.
Chinese authorities said Friday that they have shut down more than 15,400 small mines across the country because they were dangerous, according to Xinhua.
Even so, 23,500 similar operations still are running, Xinhua said, citing Wang Xianzheng, director of the State Administration of Production Safety.