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[video]http://cnn.com/video/?/video/world/2010/11/22/bts.nz.missing.miners.tvnz[/video]
A second robot has arrived at the site of a coal mine in New Zealand where an explosion trapped 29 workers underground, police said.
But police officials stressed that it remained too dangerous for human rescuers to go underground, and the situation at the mine was growing increasingly grim with each passing hour.
"The situation is bleak. It is grave. And you have to understand that the risk posed by a secondary explosion is real," Gary Knowles, superintendent of the Tasman Police District, told reporters Tuesday.
While teams are preparing for a rescue, he said, "the likeliness of this occurring is diminishing."
No one has heard from the men -- ages 17 to 62 -- since Friday's explosion. Workers are trying to drill a hole down into the mine to contact the men, but a potentially explosive mix of gases inside has kept rescuers from entering.
Earlier Tuesday, police said the first military-operated robot dispatched to search for signs of life in the mine had broken down about 550 meters (1,800 feet) inside the tunnel.
A second New Zealand military robot arrived later in the day, Knowles said, and negotiations to get additional robots from America and Australia were underway.
Late Tuesday, officials showed family members and reporters a closed-circuit television video of the mine's entrance during Friday's blast.
The minute-long video shows dust flying and a white screen flapping back and forth before it is blown out of the tunnel.
"The video is not conclusive. It's not new evidence. It's not anything new. It was certainly ... a strong piece of information for me, because it showed that the blast was quite large and went on for a long time," said Peter Whittall, CEO of mine owner Pike River Coal.
Whittall noted that the "sobering" video recording showed a site at least 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles) away from the blast. Offcials decided to play it for family members and reporters to illustrate "how dangerous it would be to re-enter the mine," he said.
Officials said rescuers were still working on a 6-inch-wide bore hole, which will allow rescue workers to collect gas samples and other data once it breaks through. Drill crews had bored about 145 meters (476 feet) into the earth Tuesday evening.
Workers expect to put laser imaging gear down the hole so they can see what it looks like inside the mine, which is located on the west coast of southern New Zealand, between Greymouth and Reefton.
Mineworkers have cleared a site for a second hole, closer to where the miners are expected to be, and drilling on that hole could begin soon, Whittall said.
A camera dropped into the mine through another hole Tuesday showed minor damage and general disrepair, Whittall said, but there were no signs that anyone had entered the area.
Minister of Police Judith Collins said many unknowns remained in the difficult search effort.
"What we do know, though, is just what a dangerous situation this is. The decision has been made at this stage that we cannot risk the rescue crew in this way," she said. "And also for those who might be alive, that they cannot be further endangered."
Most of the missing are from New Zealand, but there also are miners from Australia, Scotland and South Africa in the group. Rescuers are holding out hope that the men are breathing fresh air in a ventilation shaft, and they say they are committed to searching until they find the miners.
But while drinking water is available inside the mine, the trapped men likely brought only enough food for a single day. And the missing men had been spread throughout the mine, with about half likely to have been in one area, Whittall said.
Two of their colleagues escaped the mine soon after the explosion by walking out through a tunnel, the mouth of which is about 2.2 kilometers (1.4 miles) from where the 29 missing men might be.
