Panel on Lalmatia colliery mishap to submit report in a month

The high-powered panel set up to examine the cause of CIL arm Eastern Coalfields' opencast coal mine collapse at Lalmatia, Jharkhand will submit its report in a month.
The high-powered committee under the chairmanship of the CMD of Central Mine Planning and Design Institute (CMPDI), consultancy arm of Coal India Ltd (CIL), "shall submit its report within one month," the coal PSU said in a memorandum.
The six-member panel would examine the cause of the accident, human failure, if any, whether the accident could have been avoided by taking identified corrective measures, it said.
The panel would also examine measures to avoid recurrence of such accidents in future in Rajmahal OCP and other Open Cast mines of CIL with similar workings, it added.

According to an ECL official so far 18 dead bodies have been recovered from the site of collapse.
R R Mishra, officiating CMD of ECL had yesterday said, "We are carrying on the rescue operation in a systematic manner so that the situation does not aggravate as the debris is too much and it should not fall."

Danger zones have been declared around the place of incidents to restrict the entry of people there. Moreover, police and CISF officials have been stationed to restrict entry of people in the danger zone, he had said.
Central Mine Planning and Design Institute (CMPDIL) has deployed magneto meters along with imaging system for locating magnetic and conductive material up to a depth of 80 meters.

The incident occurred at around 7.30 PM on December 29 when a massive mound of earth came crashing down on excavators at Lalmatia open cast coal mine of Eastern Coalfields Ltd (ECL), the worst such disaster in over a decade.
The rescue operations were launched immediately after the incident.