Six more bodies were recovered early Wednesday morning from a coal mine in Fuxin city, northeast China's Liaoning province, where a gas explosion occurred on Monday, bringing the death toll to 209, rescuers confirmed.

A source with the headquarters in charge of rescue work said that 29 miners were injured and six others were still missing.

One worker in charge of the ventilation system was saved Tuesday afternoon and is now in a stable condition, according to hospital sources.

The gas blast occurred at about 3:00 PM Monday, about 242 meters underground in Sunjiawan colliery.

Three hundred and thirty out of the 574 miners on duty escaped, and 244 miners were trapped beneath the shaft.

The Sunjiawan colliery has 3,100 workers and two coal mines. The Haizhou coal mine, the one where the disaster took place, produces 1.5 million tons of coal annually.

(Xinhua News Agency February 16, 2005)