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Tuesday, October 27, 2009.

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Shannon de Ryhove.

Making headlines today:

Rescue teams have freed two workers who had remained trapped underground at Harmony Gold's Target mine, near Welkom, in the Free State, following a fall-of-ground incident on Monday afternoon.

Spokesperson Marian van der Walt confirmed that both employees had been rescued late on Monday. They are both being treated in hospital and are in a stable condition.

Two other mineworkers died in the fall-of-ground incident.

Van der Walt said that an in loco inspection of the mine would begin on Tuesday. She noted that no mining was presently taking place in the area where the incident occurred.

Nearly 130 workers have lost their lives in South Africa's mining industry, so far, this year.

Equipment giant Caterpillar has begun notifying about 2 500 laid-off US employees that they won't return to the company.

At the same time, however, the firm has started bringing back other laid-off workers at various facilities, and will return others as demand for its products increases in the coming months.

About 550 laid-off US employees have returned, or will return, to work before the end of 2010, including support, management and production employees.

Caterpillar is the world's biggest manufacturer of construction and mining equipment and responded to the sharp downturn in demand by curtailing output levels and laying off thousands of workers.

Also making headlines:

The strike at Chile's Spence mine persists after talks.
Gold miner Harmony says that a gold price above $1 000/oz is unlikely to be sustainable in the long run.
Toro Energy raises 40-million-Australian-dollars for its Australian uranium project.
And, coal-miner SouthGobi Energy gets 500-million-dollars of financing from the China Investment Corporation.

That's a round up of news making headlines today. For more on these and other stories please visit miningweekly.com.