A landslide hit a gold mine in Turkey on Tuesday, trapping nine miners. Hundreds of rescue workers were searching for the miners, whom the Guardian describes as being "swallowed" by a "cyanide-laced landslide"—the chemical compound is in the ground in the area because it's used to extract gold from ore, and because it's highly toxic, the search is complicated. The soil also reportedly contains sulphuric acid. A rep from Turkey's Independent Mining Labor Union says specialized equipment will be needed. Per the BBC, video shows "a torrent of mud sweeping through the valley" that holds the Copler mine, an open pit mine that activists have tried to shut down in the past due to a cyanide leak.
A stream running from the open pit over which the landslide swept has been sealed off to avoid the Euphrates River being contaminated. "For years, that mountain was being blown up, gold extracted from it … and the waste was piled aside like a mountain of garbage. Now this huge mass, bathed in cyanide, flows towards the Euphrates River," says the former president of the Chamber of Mining Engineers. Adds an engineer who co-authored a report on the mine's safety, "We are talking about a mountain weighing millions of tons. We have warned about this many times." (More Turkey stories.)
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