Thobela Booi arrived in Welkom, a mining town, with hopes of landing a job that would allow him to support his wife and child. He ended up 1,500 metres underground, killed by the fumes of a raging fire.

Booi, 30, had been one of hundreds of desperate labourers who risk their lives working in the shadows of legal mining operations, sneaking in through abandoned or poorly secured shafts and making their way through a warren of interconnecting tunnels to the ore.

South Africa is the world's largest producer of gold and as the bullion price has risen - and legal mines dig ever deeper to meet the world's voracious demand - so have the risks these "gold pirates" are prepared to incur in pursuit of the precious metal.

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