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Rescue teams were searching a West Virginia coal mine Friday for two miners separated from their crew as they were escaping a fire, officials said.

"Time is not our friend," said Gov. Joe Manchin. "The longer the time goes, the more difficult it becomes, so we're concerned about that."

The miners' names and ages were not released at the request of the families, who are awaiting word at a nearby church, the governor said.

Five mine rescue teams were working underground trying to reach them, according to Doug Conaway, director of the West Virginia Office of Miners' Health, Safety and Training.

Rescuers are using infrared technology to scan the area and have found heavy smoke at mine entries, he said.

The fire apparently began on a mechanical belt inside the Aracoma Alma Mine No. 1 Thursday night, government and mine officials said. The Massey Energy-owned mine is located in Logan County, West Virginia, about 60 miles southwest of Charleston.

A crew of 12 was working in the mine when a monitor went off at 5:36 p.m., indicating a fire, said Conaway.

Ten miners encountered smoke but safely exited to safety about two hours later, only to find their two colleagues were missing, Conaway said. The ten were unable to offer much information about the location of the missing miners.

The mine's ventilation system was working "as far as we can tell," he said later, adding there was no reason for it to stop operating.

Carbon monoxide levels appear to have stabilized by Friday morning, Conaway said.

The mine has not had any fatal accidents since 1995, the earliest year tracked by the U.S. Labor Department's Mine Safety and Health Administration.

Last year, Alma Mine 1 had a nonfatal accident rate of 9.01, compared with the national average of 6.39. The year before, the mine had a nonfatal accident rate of 0.82, compared with the national average of 5.66.

The accident comes less than a month after the disaster at the Sago Mine in Tallmansville where 12 miners died. The only survivor remained hospitalized Friday. (Read latest on his condition)

Unlike with Sago, "We have a difference this time," said Manchin. "We don't have an explosion, which is good news."

And although carbon monoxide is always present in a mine fire, he said, levels were "nowhere near what they were in the Sago Mine."

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/01/20/mine.fire/index.html