After hours of scanning, Stilfontein rescue teams say no more signs of illegal miners underground

STILFONTEIN - After hours of scanning for signs of life at a disused gold mine in Stilfontein, mine rescue teams say they've found no other illegal miners underground.
 
A technical team driving an operation to shut down an illicit mining network sent high-tech equipment down shaft 11 earlier on Thursday.
 
This comes after volunteers assisting with the retrieval operation told police on Wednesday that there were no more illegal miners at the Buffelsfontein mine.

ALSO READ:

• SANCO battling to face relatives of illegal miners still hoping for their safe return

• Calls mount for establishment of commission of inquiry into govt's response to Stilfontein

• Stilfontein illicit gold trade: Police probing how the mineral changes hands from mine to market

• More pathology teams roped in to deal with rising death toll in Stilfontein

A cage mounted with cameras was sent down to verify the claims.
 
Lead rescuer in the operation and CEO of Mine Rescue Services, Mannas Fourie, said the operation had been a success so far.
 
"It's a huge operation. I think the biggest challenge is the risk working over this open hole. Our people every now and then needs to approach this hole, we had to park this truck right against this hole, so there were a lot of risks that we had to anticipate, challenge was to prepare the site, the weather was also a challenge for us but I think we pulled it off well and successfully and we can say we've rescued and recovered a lot of people."
 
The mine rescue experts are now expected to compile a report and hand it over to police to decide on a way forward.