Radio New Zealand - Te Reo Irirangi o Aotearoa

Receivers urged to enter Pike mine

Updated at 1:23 pm on 28 March 2011

Greymouth Mayor Tony Kokshoorn is urging the receivers of the Pike River Coal mine to enter it or give the recovery operation to someone else.

Twenty-nine men were killed in an explosion in the West Coast mine on 19 November but no-one has gone in since.

Mr Kokshoorn says his community is becoming increasingly frustrated that no one has tried to enter the mine since the disaster.

The mayor says all attempts with robots and video footage from inside the mine have failed and it is time that the receivers from PricewaterhouseCoopers did something new.

Mr Kokshoorn says if the receivers are not willing to go in they should sell the mine to Solid Energy, which has promised to try to recover the bodies.

The lead lawyers for the families of the men killed, Colin Smith, says the company is focusing on drilling a new hole into the mine shaft, but there has not been any new information for some weeks.

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