The tour guide from Colorado was a person who died in an accident at the Mollie Kathleen Gold Mine

The person who died in an accident at the Mollie Kathleen gold mine in Colorado on Thursday was a 46-year-old tour guide. Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell identified him Friday as Patrick Weier and that he lived in the area of ​​Cripple Creek and Victor.

“We ask you to have compassion on the gentleman and his family. He leaves behind a 7-year-old child,” said Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell.

After the accident that caused Weier's death and injured four other people 500 feet underground in a mine shaft, the group joined Weier's tour were educated to the surface. Another group of visitors to the mining tour were further underground at the time and were temporarily trapped out of concern for the safety of the elevator. After about six hours they were brought to the surface following repairs to the mine shaft elevator.

The injured suffered minor injuries.

Federal investigators, along with the Teller County Sheriff's Office, have joined the investigation into what went wrong.

“At this time we do not know what happened at 500 feet to cause this. We’re working on that,” Mikesell said.

“I don’t know that that was a stopping point. I'm very sure (the elevator) was going down when this happened and then it was brought back up from there.”

Mikesell said there was a mechanical problem with the doors.

“Anytime you’re dealing with heavy machinery and 1,000 feet in altitude. Accidents can occur in a mine up to a height of 500 feet. And that was a tragic accident.”

The sheriff said the work by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Mine Safety and Health Administration to determine the cause of the accident will likely take a while “because they're dealing with a lot of information and trying to piece things together so they never have another mine accident again.” “

“They do a very good job of identifying and picking apart what could have happened,” Mikesell said.

The U.S. Department of Labor released a statement on the tragedy, saying it was “saddened by this event and our thoughts are with all those affected.” They further wrote: “The Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) implements the provisions of the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977 (Mine Act), as amended by the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response (MINER) Act of 2006 The authority's mission is to protect the safety and health of the country's miners. The authority has no jurisdiction over closed mines. The US authority (OSHA) has launched an investigation. While OSHA does not discuss the details of an ongoing inspection, we will share our findings once the investigation is complete.”

The Mollie Kathleen Gold Mine is not an active gold mine, but is located in a historic mining area and approximately half a mile from an active mine. Tours of the mine have been taking place for about 60 years, and during that time the operation was run by a family from Colorado.