Shaft to rescue trapped Chile miners to be completed

SAN JOSE MINE, Chile, Oct 9, AFP Chilean rescuers were to complete Saturday a shaft that will play a key role in bringing to the surface 33 miners who have been trapped in a collapsed mine for a record two months.

The shaft would break through to the men “within 24 hours overnight or around dawn on Saturday, we cannot be certain about the exact timing,” Mines Minister Laurence Golborne said Friday.

One top government official suggested the first miners could be pulled up to the surface early next week.

“Tuesday, Tuesday,” Health Minister Jaime Manalich told reporters outside the remote San Jose Mine in northern Chile after being asked when the operation to bring the men to the top could begin.

He cautioned though that, depending on how engineers decided to shore up the shaft, it would still take three to eight days before they could start bringing the miners to the surface.

And a senior engineer said that, in what could be a risky operation, the miners would have to set off explosives to widen the bottom of the mine so the rescue cage would fit.

“It’s an explosion and that means taking precautions. We have to clear the area so that the shock wave doesn’t reach anyone,” said Andre Sougarret, the engineer in charge.

Excitement built Friday with journalists and camera crews from around the world gathering, hoping to capture the first images of the men emerging from the mine. More than 1,000 reporters are expected to have arrived by the weekend.

“God be willing, in a few days the whole country will be weeping with joy... when we see these miners emerge from the depths of the mountain to embrace their wives, children, mothers and fathers,” said President Sebastian Pinera.

Engineers had initially predicted the first dramatic rescues would not be until Christmas.

Stuck more than 700 meters (2,300 feet) underground since the San Esteban Mining company mine caved in on August 5, the men have survived longer than any similarly trapped before.

Initially they were all thought to have perished. Then after two weeks of silence came an extraordinary note, penned in capitals and written with red ink, that gave Chile the miraculous news that the miners were still alive.

“All 33 of us are well inside the shelter,” said the note, written by the eldest miner, 63-year-old Mario Gomez, and attached to a drill bit which breached their shelter on August 22.

A costly million-dollar rescue operation swung into place, including engineers and mining experts, but also medics and psychiatrists whose job was to help the men cope with their enforced confinement.

Cameras lowered through small bore holes have revealed pictures of the men, lit mainly by the lamps on their hard-hats, grimy and dusty and often bare-chested because of the stifling heat.

Most of the men 32 Chileans and one Bolivian are between 40 and 63, but eight are in their twenties, and 19-year-old Jimmy Sandez has not even graduated from high school.

Now they are celebrities, with the world glued to the twists and turns of their nightmarish ordeal. Friday marked the 65th day of their confinement in a space the size of a living room.

The miners “have shown signs of anxiety as was to be expected. Others have had higher than desirable increases in blood pressure,” said Manalich, the health minister.

On the surface, the families have maintained a constant and anxious vigil in the makeshift “Camp Hope”. Esperanza, or hope, was also the name of a baby girl born while her father was trapped below ground.

“I am happy, happy,” said Carla Herrera, the sister of miner Daniel Herrera. “But I’m also sick of all this hullabaloo. It want it to be over now.” Rescuers will use an Austrian-made hoisting system of pulleys and cranes to lower the rescue cage down the shaft and slowly extract the miners.

Engineers say each agonizingly slow trip could take up to 1.5 hours, meaning the entire rescue could last up to two days.

It is thought one of the strongest men will test the system first, followed by those deemed to be in the weakest health. Many of the men suffer from skin infections from being in damp, humid conditions for so long.

Shift supervisor Luis Urzua is likely to wait to go last. Should a miner hit a snag during the ascent, he will be able to lower himself slowly back down to the shelter with the help of wheels on the sides of the cage.

On the surface, medics are preparing to give the miners emergency aid and rush them by helicopter to a hospital in the nearby town of Copiapo.