Eight Honduras miners rescued, three still trapped
Rescue workers in Honduras have freed eight of the 11 men who became trapped in a small gold mine on Wednesday.
The authorities said rescue efforts were continuing to free the remaining three miners who are still underground.
They were all cut off after a landslide blocked their tunnel exit near the town of El Corpus, 110km (70 miles) south of the capital, Tegucigalpa.
Informal mines are common in Honduras but the lack of adequate safety means serious accidents are not unusual.
The mine is in an area prone to landslides and quakes.
Rescue work 'continues'
'We've managed to rescue eight [miners]. They've made it out of the tunnel,' said Emergencies Commission director Moises Alvarado.
Mr Alvarado told journalists the men had been taken to hospital and rescue efforts were now 'continuing for the other three people'.
He said the trapped men had been located underground and could be freed in the 'next couple of hours'.
Firefighters, volunteers and people who live near the mine have been helping with the rescue, but their work was progressing 'slowly and with difficulty' because of bad weather and the risk of another landslide.
Firefighter Oscar Triminio said he and his colleagues could not use heavy machinery because the mine 'was unstable and could further collapse'.
The accident happened in a vertical tunnel at a depth of about 80m (260ft), Mr Triminio continued.
The mayor of the nearby town of El Corpus, Luis Andres Rueda, said there were more than 50 informal mines in the area.
He estimated that daily hundreds of people used ladders to climb down into shafts as deep as 200m.
Armed with pickaxes, they hack away at the tunnel walls to try to extract minute gold nuggets from the soil.
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