(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-10-09 13:28

FUZHOU -- At least one worker was killed and four others remained missing in a flooded colliery in east China's Fujian Province, local authority said on Tuesday.

Mountain torrents flushed the Chankeng coal mine of Yongding County, in Fujian's farmost western area that has not been affected by tropical storm Krosa, at about 11:00 am Sunday, trapping two electricians working underground, according to the provincial coal production watchdog.

Three workers who entered the shaft to rescue them also failed to get out of the flooded pit.

Rescuers retrieved the body of one of the trapped people on Tuesday and are still searching for the four missing.

Krosa churned its way to the East China Sea on Monday after pounding China's southeast coast for more than 26 hours. It made landfall in the bordering area between Zhejiang and Fujian provinces on Sunday afternoon as a typhoon and quickly weakened to a tropical storm without causing deaths on the Chinese mainland.

It has brought gales and downpours, prompting evacuation of more than 1.4 million people and incurring nearly 8 billion yuan (over US$1 billion) in economic losses in the two worst-hit provinces. The storm also affected Anhui Province and Shanghai before it left Chinese mainland.