A gas explosion on Friday left 49 miners dead in east China's Jiangxi Province, official sources said.

The blast occurred at 11:45 am at the Jianxin Coal Mine of the Fengcheng Coal Mine Bureau in Jiangxi. The bodies of the dead have been recovered.

The Jianxin Coal Mine, with an annual capacity of 600,000 tons, is a large state-owned mine.

Meng Jianzhu, secretary of the provincial committee of the Chinese Communist Party, and Provincial Governor Huang Zhiquan have rushed to the scene to monitor rescue work.

Five officials, including Liang Jiakun, deputy head of the State Administration for Safe Production Supervision and the Committee for Workplace Safety under the State Council, were on the way to the coal mine.

The cause of the explosion was still unknown at press time.  

The latest data from the SAWS, which is China's top work safety watchdog, showed that by Friday 114 severe workplace accidents have been recorded this year, killing at least 1,997 people.

In China, the severe workplace accident refers to those that kill more than 10 people.

SAWS' statistics also indicate that more than 720,000 workplace accidents have occurred during the first nine months, killing more than 96,000 people.

(Xinhua News Agency November 15, 2003)