A massive rescue operation is under way to reach hundreds of coal miners trapped underground after an explosion.
Only 350 people have been accounted for from the 787 in the mine at the time of the blast, and 205 of them have been confirmed as dead.
The BBC reports that a huge operation is under way to reach hundreds more trapped miners, and oxygen is being pumped underground.
Energy Ministry Taner Yildiz said the blast inside the mine at Soma in Manisa province was triggered by an electrical fault.
Mr Yildiz said carbon monoxide poisoning had claimed many lives.
Oxygen was pumped into the mine to help those still trapped.
Hundreds of worried relatives had gathered near the privately owned mine, about 450km west of capital Ankara.
A miner is reunited with his father after emerging from the collapsed mine. Photo: AFP
The blast happened in the power unit of the mine in Soma, around 120km northeast of the Aegean coastal city of Izmir, triggered an electricity outage, making the elevators unusable and leaving hundreds of miners stranded beneath the surface.
The BBC reported that those trapped were about 2km below the surface and 4km from the mine's exit.
Thousands of family members and fellow workers, clamouring for information, gathered outside the town's hospital, held back behind police lines, Reuters reported.
Turkish President Abdullah Gul ordered the regional governor to deploy all resources to rescue the miners.
The headgear of the collapsed mine in Soma district in western Turkey. Photo: AFP
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan cancelled a day trip to Albania, scheduled for Wednesday, and was due to go to the site of the disaster, sources in his office said.
Turkey's worst mining accident was in 1992, when a gas explosion killed 263 workers in the Black Sea province of Zonguldak. The country has a poor health and safety record in mining, particularly coal.
In May 2010, another gas explosion killed 30 miners, again in Zonguldak province.
A relative of one of the dead miners is given word about his fate. Photo: AFP
