Two miners who went missing after a mine in Australia collapsed have died.
According to local media, Dylan Langridge and Trevor Davis were driving 125m (410ft) underground inside the Dugald River mine in Queensland on Wednesday when the ground gave way.
They, along with their utility vehicle, a drill rig, and the drill rig operator, fell 25 meters into a void.
Before being treated for minor injuries, the drill rig operator managed to escape and raise the alarm.
The bodies of Mr Langridge and Mr Davis were discovered after a “significant” search operation at the mine near Cloncurry, according to Perenti, the global mining group that employed them.
“This is a heartbreaking outcome, and I want to express my heartfelt sympathies and condolences to Trevor and Dylan’s families, friends, colleagues, and loved ones, both of whom should have returned home safely from work yesterday,” chief executive Mark Nowell said on Thursday.
The two men were described as “fly-in, fly-out workers,” a common practice in parts of Australia in which employees are temporarily flown to remote work sites.
Mr Langridge, 33, will join Barminco, a Perenti company, in March 2020, according to Perenti. Later that year, he started working at the Dugald River mine.
Mr Davis, 36, had been working at the mine since November 2021, having joined the company a year before. According to the company, both worked as charge-up operators.
According to mine owner MMG, all operations at the zinc mine were halted during the search.
Rescuers worked all night using heavy equipment to gain access to the utility vehicle, and MMG general manager Tim Akroyd announced on Thursday morning that a mission to recover it from below had begun.