The eight bodies were found in a pond close to the mine shaft, where rescuers assumed the victims had tried to shelter from fire and smoke.

Another 26 bodies were retrieved from the pit Tuesday night.

The miners either suffocated or drowned at Nanshan Colliery in Wangyu Village of Lingshi County, where explosives illegally stored in a shaft caught fire at 7:40 p.m. Sunday.

Sixty-six people were in the pit when the fire broke out, according to the latest statistics released by the emergency rescue headquarters. Thirty escaped and two were saved in the search-and-rescue operation.

Rescuers found two storage sites in the shaft. One of them caught fire and the other, about 20 meters from the first, contained about four tons of explosives, all of which were ignited by the flames, said Feng Kaicheng, vice head of Lingshi County and head of the rescue operation.

By Tuesday noon, the flames in the shaft had been put out and toxic gas levels dropped by midday on Wednesday.

The State Council set up an investigation task force, headed by Zhao Tiechui, director of the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety Supervision, on Wednesday to investigate the tragedy.

Zhao blamed poor management of the coal mine and slack supervision of the local government for the accident.

The production licence of the village-run Nanshan Coal mine expired at the end of last year and rescuers found it had neither a gas monitoring system nor a lifesaving appliance in the shaft.

Zhao also found it was designed to produce 90,000 tons a year but its actual annual production was around 30,000 tons, and the mine employed 139 people, instead of 120 according to a management declaration.

According to the province's regulation on coal mine management issued last year, coal mines whose annual production is lower than 90,000 tons should be closed, said Zhao.

"How could this coal mine be in operation illegally for nearly one year?" said Zhao.

"Those who are found to be responsible for the accident will receive due punishment," he said.

Zhao ordered the local government to strengthen its management and supervision of the production of medium and small coal mines and to publicize a "black list" of the collieries which should be closed by the end of November.

Police are chasing several of the coal mine managers, including the mine head Geng Runyu who fled after the accident.

Most of the miners were migrant workers from eastern Shandong Province and southwestern Sichuan Province and some of their families have arrived at the coal mine.

Families of each of the dead will be given at least 200,000 yuan (25,440 U.S. dollars) in compensation.

Wednesday also saw the death toll climb to 41 in another coal mine tragedy, also in the coal-rich province of Shanxi Province, which occurred on November 5 at Jiaojiazhai Colliery in Xinzhou. Six more are feared dead.