At least 17 coal miners have been killed and hundreds more are feared trapped underground after an explosion and fire in western Turkey.<br /><br />Rescue teams are desperately trying to reach more than 200 workers believed to be below the surface.<br /><br />Initial reports suggest the disaster at the mine in Soma, some 120 km northeast of the Aegean coastal city of Izmir, was caused by an electrical fault.<br /><br />As oxygen was being pumped into mine shafts where the trapped workers are thought to be, those injured in the blast were being treated in hospital.<br /><br />Relatives gathered amid uncertainty over who was or was not in the mine, with the explosion said to have happened during a change in shifts.<br /><br />Local media says many of the almost 600 people believed to have been inside did manage to escape.
