ZHENGZHOU, May 17 (Xinhuanet) -- Rescuers turned their endeavor toput out the fire inside the waste rock mountain Tuesday to prevent possible hazards after recovering all eight people missing in a waste rock mountain collapse and eruption in Pingdingshan, a city in central China's Henan Province.

    The death toll stood at eight about 40 hours after the accident, which also left another 122 people injured and destroyed 18 houses nearby. Six people wounded in the collapse were still in critical condition, according to four hospitals where those injured were treated.

    Smoke still billowed out of the waste rock mountain and crackedrocks fell at times from the 80-meter high hill.

    Rescuers plan to pave several channels to extinguish the fire by spraying liquid carbon dioxide across the hill surface while injecting chemicals inside the waste rock to stop the rock from self inflaming again.

    The "rarely seen" collapse occurring at about 7:40 p.m. Sunday,burying 18 houses some 100 meters away from the waste rock hill, which belongs to the Pingdingshan Coal Industrial Group, one of the province's major coal producers.

    Shortly after the accident, more than 200 coal mine rescuers armed with bulldozers were mobilized by local government to dig out the trapped miners under the debris. Some had to use spades oreven their hands to search for survivors.

    The coal ore mixed among the rocks suddenly erupted and broke into fire due to exposure to pouring rain during the rescue efforts, leaving about 40 rescuers to suffer burns to different extent and blocking a nearby highway below the mountain.

    "We have rarely experienced such rock hill eruption and fires since our 50 years of exploitation here," said an official with the coal group who is guiding the rescue work at the scene. "We have never heard about the reports of such accident in other mines across the country."

    "All we need is to further probe into the accident to find out the exact cause," he said.

    A group of experts from China Mining University and Henan University of Technology have arrived at the scene to help with the investigation.

    Waste rock mountains scatter around the mining area of the Pingdingshan coal group, which turns out 30 million tons of coal annually. To prevent similar tragedy, the group have organized a massive inspection of other waste rock hills and houses nearby. Enditem