Two gold miners died while four survived at Mukingi Village in Vihiga when they were continuing with their activities at the mines on Tuesday evening after a section of the mine collapsed burying them alive.
The two men John Amugune and Patrick Mudanya 59 and 49 respectively died during an evening mining session an incident reported to have happened after a minor tremor.
Area chief Francis Kidiga said this was the first major accident in the area since the mining began. He said a similar but serious accident had happened in the site in 1992 where 8 people died.
“The accident happened at around 11.30 am, other miners who were present tried to rescue their colleagues but failed,” Kidiga said, “They managed to retrieve the bodies from the ground and immediately alerted the Kilingili police. ” He said.
Their efforts to save the situation were futile due to what they termed lack of modern equipment’s and emergency facilities at the mine.
Chief Francis Kidiga said they had been advising the miners to use modern methods of mining gold which are safe rather than the older and risky methods.
The bodies were not taken to the mortuary as the families lamented being financially unstable to handle the morgue’s cost of preserving the bodies.
The county Government promised to cater for the burial expenses.
