WorldAt least 11 coal miners were killed Thursday when a methane gas blast tore through a pit in western Ukraine, the head of the coal miners' trade union said. “A methane explosion. 11 killed,” Mykhaylo Volynets wrote on Facebook. Ukraine's emergencies service said that 20 people were unaccounted for and that 172 miners were in the pit at the time. Ukraine relies heavily on coal for electricity and heat despite efforts by Western donors to weaken the former Soviet republic's dependency on the polluting fuel.

Source: Sunday Times March 02, 2017 12:56 UTC