"Two killed, around 20 missing after jade mine collapse in Hpakant", 22 July 2025

At least two people were killed … with as many as 20 missing when part of hillside under a slag heap collapsed at a jade extraction site in Hpakant Township, Kachin State, local residents said.

The collapse of the muddy pile of mining refuse is the latest in a series of similar incidents in and near Hpakant, Myanmar’s most important centre for jade production. It occurred at around 9am at the Tin Aung Kyaing company’s old mining site in Hpakant Township’s Taung Yar Kone village, Long Hkin village tract.

Some residents reported that approximately 20 people may be trapped underground after heaps of jade mining waste fell in a massive mudslide at the old Tin Aung Kyaing company site in Taung Yar Kone village, Long Hkin village tract.

“We’ve recovered one body, and we’re quite sure another person didn’t make it. We had been searching for him, and just heard they’d found him too. So, that makes two confirmed deaths,” a local man said. “They’re still trying to verify how many people are actually missing in the collapse.”

He added that the two identified men who died were 19 and 42 years old…

He said that with no updated list of missing persons available, rescue operations were called off around 2pm after the confirmation of only two deaths.

The likeliest cause of the landslide was recent rainy weather, which had saturated and loosened the soil on the embankments and heaps of mining waste surrounding the extraction sites, the man from Hpakant explained.

“The rain was heavy the night before, and in the morning, part of the ground near a house by the embankment in Taung Yar Kone collapsed and slid down. Two people digging there were buried under the falling heap of dirt,” the man said…