Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Thursday that rescue crews will work nonstop to liberate ten miners trapped in a flooded coal mine in Mexico’s northern border state of Coahuila.
Three wells at the mine spilled on Wednesday, forcing an inner wall to collapse, trapping the men.
“I want us to rescue the miners with all my soul,” Lopez Obrador said during a routine press conference.
Five others were able to escape received medical treatment, and two of them have been discharged from a public clinic, Laura Velazquez, head of Mexico’s civil protection agency, said.
Several hundred local and federal officials were responding to the accident, according to authorities, underscoring a “firm commitment” to rescuing the trapped miners, which requires pumping wells to send rescue teams down to the mines.