Mr. Murray has said no retreat mining — a method of coal recovery — was being done at Crandall Canyon when the collapse occurred.

Kirsti Loveland said her husband and other miners who escaped alive on Thursday night were angry and frustrated by the conditions of the rescue effort. She said that her husband, who works at another mine owned by Murray Energy, was told he had to work on the rescue effort although he felt it was too dangerous, and that he has been earning less than he does during his shifts at the mine where he normally works.

“He is angry and very emotional,” Ms. Loveland said of her husband, whom she would not identify because she feared he would lose his job.

Murray Energy’s general counsel, Mike McKown, denied that miners were obligated to work on the rescue effort. “They are all volunteers,” Mr. McKown said. “They are happy to help, They are a brotherhood of miners.” He also said there was no disparity in wages between rescue and mining jobs.

At Crandall Canyon, rescue workers and mining safety experts met today to discuss whether a horizontal rescue tunnel similar to that which collapsed Thursday night could be safely resumed.

Gestures of charity and kindness toward the mine victims’ families have come in from around the country. A family from the Indiana town where several miners died days after the Crandall County mine collapse sent six hand-knit dolls, three with darker skin representing the Mexican men who are among those trapped, along with a note about shared agony, to the families of all six.

A couple in Price held raised held a car wash that raised more $1,000 for the families of the victims, part of the more than $25,000 that Mayor Hilary Gordon of Huntington estimated has been raised so far.