The World - News from June 3, 1988

Rescue workers using a crane began removing the bodies of 57 miners killed when explosions ripped through a coal mine in Borken, West Germany. Officials are almost certain that no one survived the disaster, the nation’s worst since 299 miners died in a 1962 disaster. Thirty-six bodies have been located in a 15-mile maze of tunnels. Dozens of rescue workers equipped with oxygen packs were sent 500 feet underground to wrap the corpses in plastic and tie them to stretchers. Most of the dead were killed by the blast, but some suffocated when their oxygen tanks ran out and they were overcome by carbon monoxide. Officials are still investigating the cause of the disaster.