UPDATED 9.29pm Rescue teams are searching through 40 kilometres of tunnels in a Waihi gold mine to find an unresponsive worker.

It's believed a large underground loader has been involved in an accident at the Waihi Correnso mine and emergency services are responding.

Senior Community Advisor at OceanaGold in Waihi, Kit Wilson, said their emergency team has entered the mine.

"Right now we don't even know if anyone's injured. All we know is that we have a loader that's been involved in an incident and the driver's not responding on the radio."

Northern Ambulance Communications’ team leader Ngaire Jones said an ambulance was on scene waiting for a patient to be brought out of the mine.

“We believe there is someone trapped … fire are organizing rescue and the Westpac Rescue Helicopter from Auckland are on the scene.

Emergency services were called at 6.35pm and the ambulance has been on the scene since 7.15pm, she said.

A Northern Fire Commuications’ spokesman referred enquiries to police.

A police media spokeswoman said in a statement that police were aware of a vehicle crash at the Waihi Goldmine this evening.

“The crash has occurred on a private road and is being treated as an industrial accident. Fire service and mine rescue staff are at the scene and police are monitoring this incident.”  

According to the OceanaGold website the Correnso mine is situated between 150 and 300 metres below residential properties in Waihi East.

No further information was available.