Rescue workers on Saturday began lifting to the surface miners trapped in a flooded mine for nearly two days in southern Russia. The miners were taken from the shaft in groups of three or four in a special elevator cage. By midday, 11 miners were brought to the surface. All were taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital, and one was reported in serious condition. The miners were working some 2,625 feet on Thursday, when water from a subterranean lake leaked into a shaft above them, blocking their way to the surface, according to Col. Viktor Shkareda, head of the regional emergency department. Authorities at first announced that all 46 miners were alive and well after two rescuers reached the pitface where the miners were trapped. However, authorities later said that the rescuers had seen and spoken with 33 of the trapper miners but 13 were still unaccounted for. Some miners - their clothing soaked and covered with coal dust - refused to be put on stretchers as they emerged from the mine. One broke free and went to a rescue worker to shake hands. "Thanks folks for saving us. We are fine now," he said. About 200 relatives waited outside the mine, standing behind police cordons preventing them from speaking to the rescued miners. Authorities said relatives could meet them later in the hospital after medical checkups. Seventy-one miners were working in the Zapadnaya mine in the Rostov-on-Don region, about 600 miles south of Moscow, when the accident happened, Shkareda said. He said 25 miners managed to escape to other pits and reach the surface after the leak filled several shafts. Electricity in the mine was shut off, and the miners had low batteries and no food, Shkareda said. Trucks were dumping earth and rocks into the mine to try to plug the leak while two teams of rescuers were trying to carve tunnels from adjacent mines. Regional governor Vladimir Chub said that the teams were unable to use heavy equipment and had to use manual labor to dig the tunnels, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. The trapped miners had little air, but the rescue teams were able to make special ventilation shafts. ITAR-Tass said it was the second such accident at the Zapadnaya mine this year. Water flooded the mine in February, but nobody was inside at the time, according to the news agency. Accidents are common in the Russian coal industry, and miners stage frequent protests over wage delays and declining safety standards. According to the Independent Coal Miners' Union, 68 miners were killed on the job last year and 98 in 2001. **PHOTO CAPTION*** Rescue workers bring to the surface a miner, center, at the Zapadnaya mine in Novoshakhtinsk, southern Russia, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2003. (AP Photo/Sergei Venyavsky)