The death toll in Turkey’s mining accident has risen to 274, making it the worst such disaster in the country’s history and prompting fury aimed at the prime minister.<br /><br />Search teams are working through a second night although hopes have faded of finding survivors, despite more than 100 miners remaining unaccounted for.<br /><br />All day, anxious relatives stayed at the pit head in Soma, some 480 km southwest of Istanbul. But bodies rather than injured men were increasingly brought to the surface.<br /><br />Tuesday’s fire and explosion, apparently triggered by an electrical fault, cut off ventilation systems and electricity underground. This trapped the miners – 2 kilometres down, unable to get to the surface – with their lifts no longer working.<br /><br />Carbon monoxide poisoning claimed many lives.<br /><br />Having declared three days of national mourning, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the site and faced local anger first hand when his car was attacked by demonstrators.<br /><br />Critics blame his government for privatising the country’s mines and ignoring repeated warnings about their safety.
