Gold mine collapse kills 82 people in war-torn Sudan, dozens more feared dead

At least 82 people have died after an informal gold mine collapsed in war-torn Sudan, officials have said.

Rescuers had pulled 82 bodies out of the al-Zara mine in Nuhud, a town in West Kordofan province, by Wednesday afternoon, unnamed local officials said.

The area is controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has been fighting against the Sudanese military for more than three years.

Dozens of people remain unaccounted for, according to Suleiman Abu Hmeida from Emergency Response Rooms, a grassroots network.

The network monitors the conflict and provides support for communities across the conflict-ravaged country.

A lack of equipment is hampering rescue efforts, the official said, with only one privately-owned forklift truck in use.

Khairal-Sayed Gabara, one of the survivors, said the collapse was "massive", adding that the situation was "very dire".

"We do not have the machinery to lift dirt and stones and search for survivors at depths of more than 30 metres [100ft]," he said. "There were dozens of people working in the mine."

Al-Amin Suliman, another survivor, said 60 bodies had been recovered as of Wednesday morning, but "there are still people stuck inside".

The collapse, which started on Sunday in one of the mine shafts and spread to the other interconnected shafts, happened at one of thousands of small-scale mines scattered across Sudan.

The al-Zara mine - an informal site that employs unregulated workers - lacked basic safety and protective measures, according to the Sudan Doctors Network, a medical group tracking the war in Sudan.

The Kordofan Observatory monitoring group said the mine lies on a half-mile (1km) site on an area of fragile, sandy soil.

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Despite being a major gold producer, deadly mine collapses are not uncommon in Sudan, where safety standards are not widely applied.

Similar disasters in 2021 and 2023 killed a total of 52 people.

At least 59,000 people have died in the conflict between the RSF and the country's military, according to Armed Conflict Location & Event Data, a monitoring group.

Parts of Sudan have been pushed into famine.

Large quantities of gold have been smuggled out of the country to finance the RSF, which controls gold-producing areas in the Darfur and Kordofan regions, according to experts commissioned by the United Nations.

(c) Sky News 2026: Gold mine collapse kills 82 people in war-torn Sudan, dozens more feared dead