A tin mine operated by the Xinyi Zijin Mining company, a subsidiary of the Zijin Mining Group, in southern Guangdong province has halted production after a number of fatalities resulted in a nearby community.
A leak in the residue pool of the Xinyi Yinyan tin mine caused by heavy torrential rains flooded nearby villages and killed four villagers on Sept 25.
A tailing dam is said to have collapsed causing the leak. The run-off from the heavy rainfall carried the damaging contaminants in to the local region. The subsidiary of Zijin Mining Group which operated the mine has shut down after the incident in Xinyi city. The Guangdong provincial government is investigating the matter.
The mine was operating on a trial production basis. The shutdown of the tin mine will cause a direct loss of 19 million yuan to Zijin Mining Group or about US$2.84 million. The incident comes after Zijin Mining’s promise to improve safety measures after toxic waste from one of its mines poisoned nearly 2,000 metric tons of fish.
The Chinese gold and copper mining company is also facing suspension of production at a copper mine in the south eastern province of Fujian where the fish poisoning incident occurred in July this year.