23 miners rescued after 43 hours trapped in Colombian

 

In late September 2025, all 23 miners trapped in a collapsed gold mine in Colombia were brought to the surface alive after more than 40 hours underground. The successful rescue operation took place at the La Reliquia mine, located in the Antioquia department of northern Colombia.

The main access shaft to the mine collapsed on Monday, September 22, 2025, due to a "geomechanical failure".

Images shared by the state mining agency showed the miners brought out one by one, supported by rescuers and clutching water bottles at La Reliquia mine, some four hours from Colombia’s second city of Medellin in the northwestern Antioquia department.

“Come on, come on, you can do it!” well-wishers encouraged as the men were hauled out, clutching ropes, before falling into the embrace of family members, visibly relieved.

The miners, stuck underground since the early hours of Monday in a shaft 80 meters (262 feet) underground, had been receiving food, water and oxygen through underground pipelines.

The mine’s ventilation system continued functioning throughout.

The rescue was achieved after “48 hours of nonstop operations,” Colombia’s National Mining Agency (ANM) said on X Wednesday.

Friends and relatives waited anxiously the entire night for news on the miners’ fate.

The site is operated by a local cooperative on behalf of Canada’s Aris Mining Corporation.

Mining accidents are frequent in Colombia and claim dozens of lives each year, usually at unlicensed mines. Last year, the toll was 124, according to the ANM.

On Sunday, seven miners who had been trapped in an illegal gold mine were found dead in an area in the country’s southwest where guerrilla groups engage in gold extraction and cocaine trafficking.

Another 18 were rescued alive from a collapsed gold mine in the northwest in July after a day-long emergency operation.The mining and hydrocarbons sector accounts for half of Colombia’s legal exports.

The positive outcome contrasts with another recent mine accident in Colombia. Just a few days earlier, the bodies of seven miners were recovered from an illegal mine in Cauca province after a nine-day operation. This highlights the dangers of unlicensed and informal mining operations.