At least 36 people including five rescue workers have died following a series of explosion at a Russian coal mine, officials say.

A methane gas leak caused two explosions on Thursday, killing four miners and trapping 26 others in the Severnaya mine in Vortuka, just north of the Arctic circle.

President Vladimir Putin ordered a government inquiry into the incident but Russia's Emergencies Minister said "the circumstances in the affected part of the mine did not allow anyone to survive."

"In the underground space where the 26 miners were, there are high temperatures and no oxygen," Vladimir Puchkov said in a televised address after visiting the site.

The Emergencies Ministry said on its website that rescue operations had been stopped after a third blast early on Sunday killed six people, most of them rescue staff.