Students in Istanbul on Saturday mourning for the loss of nearly 300 miners lost in the Soma tragedy By James Tressler.

The whole nation was in mourning this past week for the deadly mining accident in the town of Soma, on the west coast of Turkey. An explosion in one of the mines trapped hundreds of workers, leaving them exposed to fire and deadly carbon monoxide gas. As of Friday, nearly 300 miners had died, and 18 more were still missing. [Ed. note — As of Sunday morning, 301 miners have been confirmed dead.]

The images from Soma have haunted the airwaves — the soot-blackened faces of survivors carried out on stretchers, the dead carried out in canvas body bags; the head-scarved women, now widowed, weeping and saying, “Let me die in the mine, too! Don’t leave me all alone!”

The Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, arrived in Soma, and the families pounded his car, calling out “Murderer!” The mourners blame the government for the disaster, citing long-standing concerns about the safety of the mines that they say were ignored.

Not eight weeks ago, Erdogan and his ruling AK Party won a sweeping re-election, and the TV was full of images of his flash-bulb lit face beaming with victory.

From his standpoint, it was a well-earned victory, reaffirming his control of a country that had for the past year been gripped by anti-government protests in Taksim. He must have thought he was in the clear, that nothing could touch him.

Now, there was the tragedy in Soma. Again, there were people in the streets, shouting his name in anger.

Erdogan, in a speech, tried to explain the tragedy by saying that such mining accidents were typical in 19th century England. He even said it was “destiny.”

Many Turks were aghast: the 19th century? Destiny? What century is this?

“It was not ‘destiny,’” says one friend, who is a mining engineer. “(It was) maximum efficiency, minimum cost. This creates a problem. So 300 people die. This is a terrible shame for Turkey.”

The prime minister, who has never taken criticism well, reportedly slapped one of the protesters (a video was posted on the Internet), and one of his advisors was seen in a video kicking a man who had struck Erdogan’s car. The advisor, citing illness, reportedly went on a weeklong vacation after the incident. One wonders why he wasn’t sacked.

Many of my Turkish friends have changed their Facebook profile pictures to a simple black frame, while others changed theirs to a black wreath of mourning. My girlfriend, Ozge, like most Turks, has been deeply moved by the tragedy at Soma.

“They showed a man on the TV, he was being pulled out of the mine,” she said. “They were going to take him to the hospital, and the man asked, ‘Should I take off my boots?’ He was trying to be polite. He was so humiliated.”

What she meant was that for so many of the victims, who come from poor, working-class families, the hospital is a luxury – and this in a country that reportedly has the highest number of labor accidents in Europe. Miners work in dangerous conditions, and earn about 500 dollars per month.

The nearly round-the-clock coverage on Turkish TV have given us similarly sad tales. One of the miners had been exposed to so much heat during the fire that his safety helmet had melted onto his face, making him unrecognizable, and his body was sent to the wrong family.

Then there were the twins, two young men who were born on the same day, had gotten married on the same day, went to work together in the mine, and as it happened, died on the same day. Behind every death there is a story, in this case they are too countless to relate here.

The image of the man dragged from the mine, and so humble in the ambulance, not wanting to dirty anything with his muddy boots, stays with me. One only hopes the state will show that man the same consideration by giving he and the other survivors adequate care (and compensation) and improving conditions so that such terrible accidents don’t happen again.

Many Turks doubt it. They remember the 1999 earthquake in Istanbul, which claimed nearly 20,000 lives. Much of the destruction was blamed on poorly constructed housing and the lack of enforcement of building codes.

“That’s what makes me sad,” Ozge said. “Because those people in the mine, they are me. If another big earthquake hits Istanbul, I will probably be buried underground too.”

James Tressler was a reporter for The Times-Standard. His latest book, “Letters from Istanbul, Vol. 1,” is available at Lulu.com. He lives in Istanbul.