The Congo copper mine accident killed about 30 people, according to officials

A bridge collapsed at a semi-industrial copper mine in southeast Congo on Saturday, killing about 30 people, according to the artisanal mining agency of the nation.

An agency official told Reuters that the incident, which happened on Saturday at the Kalando mining site in Lualaba province, resulted in 49 fatalities and 20 critically ill hospitalized individuals.

Over 10 million people in Congo are indirectly supported by artisanal mining, which employs an estimated 1.5 to 2 million individuals.

The fall was “caused by panic, reportedly triggered by gunfire from military personnel securing the site,” according to SAEMAPE, the French acronym for Congo’s Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Support and GuidanceService.

Then, SAEMAPE continued in a statement on Sunday, miners “piled on top of each other, causing injuries and death.”

Citing claims of miner-soldier conflicts, the Initiative for the Protection of Human Rights demanded an independent inquiry into the military’s involvement in the fatalities.

A request for response from a military official was not immediately answered.
32 confirmed deaths were announced in a televised speech by regional interior minister Roy Kaumba.

Numerous fatalities occur annually at locations where frequently unequipped diggers burrow far underground in unlicensed artisanal mines.