MEXICO CITY (AP) – Mexico will attempt to send an aquatic drone into a collapsed coal mine where 10 miners have been trapped since last week.
Laura Velázquez, national Civil Defense coordinator, said Monday that images from the drone could help authorities decide whether to send in divers without putting them at risk.
She also said that 25 pumps were working to remove water from the flooded shafts. Water that was once 111 feet (34 meters) deep was now between 55 and 78 feet (17 and 26 meters) deep.
The mine in Sabinas, Coahuila about 70 miles southwest of Eagle Pass, Texas, collapsed last Wednesday with 15 miners inside. Five managed to escape with injuries. Authorities say the miners breached a neighboring space filled with water. There has been no contact with the remaining 10.
The miners’ families are desperate and some complained Sunday that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador gave them little information when he visited the site.