Mausoleum for 301 Soma miners to be completed by 2015

Can Mumay ISTANBUL

Images of the planned mausoleum project obtained by daily Hürriyet.

A mausoleum project prepared for 301 miners who were killed in the country’s deadliest-ever mining accident in May in Soma will be constructed by the end of the year.

Graves for 86 workers who were killed in separate mine accidents in Soma in the past will also be placed in the mausoleum, along with the ones for the 301 miners.

Manisa Metropolitan Municipality has taken over the construction of the project after the Cemetery Directorate of Soma announced one day after the disaster that a mausoleum would be built.

The 301 workers were killed in Soma on May 13 after an explosion in the coal mine.

No stranger to deadly mining mishaps, Turkey is facing another tragedy as 18 miners are missing in an underground gallery that was flooded on Oct. 28 in the Central Anatolian province of Karaman’s Ermenek district. Search efforts have been continuing for a week, but authorities have yet to locate any of the miners.