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Hwange Residents Live In Fear As Underground Fires Rage - Part 1

Underground coal fire has ripped apart this Hwange road. Image by Cite


BY LETHOKUHLE NKOMO | @The_CBNews | This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | DEC 27, 2021

The heatwave has worsened the underground fire crisis in Hwange, and unassuming children are in danger.


HWANGE (The Citizen Bulletin) — The question of whether Hwange concession residential areas are safe from underground fires continue to boggle the minds of most community members in the mining town after there has been a series of accidents with Hwange children being burnt by underground coal fires.

Fear of an invisible death trap.

Underground coal fires continue to grip the Hwange community following high temperatures which have been experienced in the past weeks. Children are now grounded from playing and mothers are afraid to lose sight of their children in fear that they can be injured.

The dangerous areas which are under one of the leading coal mining companies the Hwange Colliery Company are leaving Hwange children from number 2, 3 and part of the number 1 villages permanently injured by the underground fires yet no one is taking responsibility.

Lovemore Ncube, Ward 15 councillor blames the Hwange colliery company for what he says is negligence on the coal dumpsite which is causing the fires.


“The fires are becoming a menace to the community of Hwange, especially in number 3 which is in my ward, any coal dump is a danger. The temperatures in Hwange are too high which in turn can ignite the fires underneath dumps.”
Lovemore Ncube, Ward 15 councillor


“These problems can be avoided; the company should improve the supply of water so that the residents desist from going to the dumpsite for toilets. The water comes only for a few hours and that is why residents especially children go to the bush. The colliery should at least provide water two times or more a day, another option is to give us tankers with water,” he says.

Although there have been awareness campaigns from the Hwange Colliery Company where residents especially children are advised about the fires, the concession areas continue to be a danger zone.

“We have been doing some awareness campaigns in schools, churches and community gatherings where we are advising learners to desist from using the dump coal sites as toilets,” says Councillor Ncube.

The hot black ground is soft and it breaks open if one puts on some weight to the ground. Children are mostly victims of the underground coal fires because they are unaware of their existence. Recently an eight-year-old Makwika village girl was rushed to Mpilo Hospital after she was burnt while relieving herself in the coal dumpsite.

Meanwhile, the Greater Whange Resident Trust Coordinator Fidelis Chima echoes similar sentiments saying the rate children are being burnt in Hwange is becoming worrisome.


“The next solution to this problem is to relocate people living close to the underground fires as soon as possible.”
Fidelis Chima, Greater Whange Resident Trust Coordinator


“We are on a campaign on just transition as fossil fuels are detrimental to the earth, coal extraction seriously destroys the environment, emits carbon, causes health hazards and our major fear is that there are high chances of methane explosions from those underground fires,” says  Chima.

Meanwhile, farmers in Madumabisa a resettlement area surrounding the Hwange colliery concession are also counting their losses as the fires are killing their livestock.


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“I have lost more than 5 goats and two cows to these fires, and when the livestock is burnt or agitated by these fires no one is willing to compensate my loss,” says Bernard Dube a farmer in Madumabisa.

Although the community of Hwange is blaming the Hwange Colliery Company for negligence, some climate scientists have blamed underground fires on the human-induced effects of climate change.

Human-caused global warming can increase extreme weather frequency and severity, for example, research shows that activities such as burning fossils fuels are unequivocal warming the planet.

Environmentalist also says that if coal fires continue for a while they negatively affect the environment and release carbon into the environment which damages the environment.


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