A gas explosion deep inside the Liushenyu coal mine in Qinyuan County, Shanxi province, has killed at least 82 workers and left another nine missing, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Saturday. The blast tore through the night shift on Friday evening; 247 miners were underground at the moment of the explosion, and more than 120 of the survivors were taken to hospitals in Changzhi and Taiyuan with severe burns or asphyxiation injuries.
The Liushenyu mine, operated by the Shanxi Tongzhou Coal & Coke Group, produces about 1.2 million tonnes a year and was added in 2024 to the National Mine Safety Administration’s list of disaster-prone sites for elevated gas content. Regulators had flagged the seam as high-risk after a routine inspection that year identified ventilation deficiencies in the working face where Friday’s explosion is believed to have originated.
President Xi Jinping ordered an "all-out" rescue and called for a "thorough investigation" with accountability "in accordance with the law." Executives of the Liushenyu Coal Industry subsidiary have been detained, and the Shanxi provincial government has suspended operations at all mines that share the same gas-management designation pending re-inspection.
Rescue teams reached the deepest sections of the affected shaft on Sunday afternoon after restoring partial ventilation. Officials said they have found no further survivors below the main fault line; recovery operations for the nine miners still missing are continuing, but state media indicated that hopes of pulling them out alive had narrowed sharply by Monday.
The death toll already makes Liushenyu the deadliest coal mining accident in China since 2016. China has invested heavily in mine safety automation over the past decade and the country’s overall mining death rate has fallen by more than two-thirds since 2010, but Shanxi remains the most exposed province: it produces roughly a third of the country’s coal and accounted for more than 40 per cent of fatal incidents reported in 2025.
The accident has reopened debate about the pace at which China is consolidating its coal industry into larger, more heavily monitored operators. Independent analysts have noted that the Shanxi Tongzhou group has acquired four mines in the past two years and that several of those acquisitions, including Liushenyu, came with outstanding safety remediation orders that had not been closed out at the time of transfer.
Shanxi’s deputy governor said on Sunday that the province would tighten the cap on mines permitted to operate during the summer high-demand season, when air-conditioning loads typically push thermal coal output higher. Power generators in northern China have been told to draw down stockpiles rather than seek emergency dispatch increases while the safety review is under way.
Funeral arrangements for the confirmed victims are being coordinated by local government offices in Qinyuan and neighbouring counties. The State Council has dispatched a working group led by a vice-premier to oversee both the investigation and survivor compensation; preliminary payments to bereaved families have been set at 1.5 million yuan per worker, with additional allowances for dependents.