Desperate search for trapped miner after flood consumes tunnels nearly a mile under mountain

A desperate search is underway Sunday for a miner who went missing after a set of mines flooded in West Virginia over the weekend, officials said.

A crew operating at the Rolling Thunder Mine in Nicholas County hit an unknown pocket of water Saturday afternoon, causing the tunnels to flood, county commissioner Garrett Cole said in a statement.

All but one miner, who has yet to be publicly identified, have been safely located, with rescue workers believing that the missing worker is trapped somewhere three-quarters of a mile beneath the mountain.

Rescue crews have been manning the pump since 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, with Cole still unsure as to how much water remains in the flooded mine and how long it will take to get it all out, local WCHS reported.

Nicholas County Homeland Security is on standby with underwater drones ready to deploy once the water has reached the acceptable level.

The drones are capable of traversing the flooded mines to help locate the missing miner and establish communications with them, Cole said.

Gov. Patrick Morrisey said the rescue operation “remains an active situation,” with multiple state agencies deployed to assess the situation.

“The West Virginia Office of Miners’ Health, Safety, and Training is coordinating with mine safety officials, the West Virginia Emergency Management Division, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, the West Virginia State Police, the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), and local emergency responders,” Morrisey said in a statement.

The governor said more information on the search will be released when developments are made.

The flooding marks the second major incident in West Virginia’s mines this month after a scoop operator died in Tucker County on Thursday.

Joey Mitchell Jr., 25, a coal miner at the Mettiki Mine, died in an accident in Mount Storm, which also left one other worker injured, state officials said without elaborating on the nature of the incident.