Chile Mining Accident (2010) - The New York Times The New York Times Supported by Chile Mining Accident (2010) News about Chile Mining Accident (2010), including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times. More Updated: Oct. 12, 2011 On Oct. 13, 2010, 33 miners who had been trapped underground for more than two months all returned to the surface after a successful rescue operation that inspired Chile and riveted the world. The miners traveled up a narrow, nearly half-mile rescue shaft in a specially designed capsule. The final phase of the long rescue effort took roughly 22 hours. Luis Urzúa, the shift leader who organized the miners’ lives while they were underground, was the last to come up. Many of the miners came bounding out of their rescue capsule as pictures of energy and health, able not only to walk, but, in one case, to leap around, hug everyone in sight and lead cheers. Their apparent robustness was testimony to the rescue diet threaded down to them through the tiny borehole that reached them on Aug.

22, but also to the way they organized themselves to keep their environment clean, find water and get exercise. The miners hoped to sell their stories as well as file a lawsuit against the mining company. But one year after their globally televised rescue, after the worldwide spotlight faded and the trips and offers dwindled, the miners said that most of them were unemployed and that many were poorer than before. The emotional distress has been more lasting than the publicity. In October 2011, nine miners were receiving sick-leave pay for prolonged post-traumatic stress; a handful of others say they are seeing private therapists. Background On Aug. 5, 2010, a gold and copper mine near the northern city of Copiapó, Chile caved in, trapping 33 miners in a chamber about 2,300 feet below the surface. For 17 days, there was no word on their fate. As the days passed, Chileans grew increasingly skeptical that any of the miners had survived — let alone all of them. But when a small bore hole reached the miners’ refuge, they sent up a message telling rescuers they were still alive.

A video camera threaded deep underground captured the first images of the miners, all apparently in good health. The discovery sparked jubilant celebrations nationwide as rescue efforts energized the country, which owes its prosperity to the rich copper mines in its northern region. The miners later used a modified telephone to sing Chile’s national anthem to the hundreds of teary-eyed relatives celebrating above. In Santiago, the capital, motorists honked their car horns and people cheered wildly on subway platforms. News reports suggested that ventilation shafts had survived the mine’s collapse, allowing enough fresh air to reach the chamber where the miners were trapped. The miners were able to use heavy equipment to provide light and charge the batteries of their head lamps, and they drank water from storage tanks to survive. They stripped off their shirts to endure the stifling heat but did not appear to be threatened by toxic gases such as methane, which can poison miners after cave-ins. Read More... Food was in short supply, and rescue crews used the tiny bore hole to thread down tubes containing sugars, water and liquid nutrients to help sustain the miners, while continuing the painstaking work of drilling another tunnel without causing another collapse.

The thin shaft became an umbilical cord to keep the miners alive, from which they could receive information about the rescue efforts and communications from family members. On Oct. 9, 2010, two excruciating months later, a more sizable drill finally broke through to the miners. It created space for a rescue shaft through which the miners were raised, one by one, in a capsule especially designed to contain a human being. As the vast team of rescue workers, medical personnel, technicians and mining experts entered the final phase a few days later, the colorful scene reflected the huge scale of the operation that captured the attention of the world: more than 1,400 journalists, together with anxious and elated family members of the miners, gathered to witness the rescue. The mine, known as San José, has had a history of accidents and was forced to shut down briefly to make safety improvements, but its owners did not carry them out, according to some lawmakers and a risk prevention specialist who worked for the company. On Oct. 12, the first rescue worker descended underground to the miners who greeted him with enthusiastic handshakes.

Late that evening, Florencio Ávalos, 31, was the first miner to ascend to the surface. Upon emerging from the capsule, miners were greeted by family and rescue workers before being led away for medical treatment. Back to Normality While the world has begun to move on, the miners are beginning to grapple with the enormousness of what happened to them. The men have resisted breaking a pact they made to keep the most gripping details of their two months in captivity to themselves in the hopes that together they can secure book or movie deals, as well as build their best case for a lawsuit against the mine. They have held especially close what happened in the first 17 days after the gold and copper mine collapsed, the time before they knew rescuers were still searching for them. Four miners who agreed to speak without pay offered a view into the intense emotional struggles they faced underground, and now above. Omar Reygadas, a great-grandfather, had survived two previous collapses at the San José Mine and narrowly escaped a third that killed another miner. But in the first days after the latest cave-in in August, he said, he cried, from feelings of sheer helplessness. Mr.

Reygadas, who at 56 was one of the oldest to have been trapped and the 17th miner to be rescued, said after the explosion the men searched for others, finding that no one had died. But whatever relief they felt was short-lived. Within hours, the men were faced with a fateful choice. There was a way out, through a ventilation shaft. But after discovering that the ladder there was too short, they knew all they could do was wait. Two days later, a boulder rolled into the shaft, sealing it for good. The miners have refused to go into great detail over what happened in the next two weeks, as men wilted in the heat and shrank, their tiny rations of tuna and crackers too meager to do much more than keep them alive. The story picks up again on Day 17, when the rescuers’ drill bit pierced the roof of their refuge, starting the clock for their eventual freeing. One thing the men were ready for was the lust for their story.

They learned that lesson firsthand, from a group of Uruguayans who had survived a 1972 airplane accident in the Andes, depicted in the 1993 movie “Alive.” The group paid the miners a visit and chatted with them via the modified telephone, Mr. Reygadas said. He said they counseled the miners to “not give away too much,” as they felt they had. Since the rescue, some men have been drinking heavily, according to a psychologist and some of the miners. And several have shown signs of emotional distress. From collapse to rescue: Inside the Chile mine disaster | Toronto Star World From collapse to rescue: Inside the Chile mine disaster On Aug. 5, 33 miners were trapped by a rock collapse. After weeks of frantic drilling, their rescue finally appears to be imminent. This is how it happened. Relatives of the trapped miners celebrate after one of the drills working to rescue the 33 finally reached their shelter in the San Jose mine, near Copiapo, Chile on October 9, 2010. (ARIEL MARINKOVIC / AFP) By Jennifer YangStaff Reporter Sun., Oct.

10, 2010 SAN JOSE MINE, CHILE—In early August, 33 miners descended deep below the dusty surface of Chile’s Atacama Desert and did not come back out. From the depths of a century-old gold and copper mine, the men — 32 Chileans and one Bolivian — have since celebrated birthdays, welcomed new babies into their lives, proposed to their lovers. But on Saturday, more than two months after a rock collapse sealed the Mina San Jose, or San Jose Mine, a rescue hole was finally completed for the miners. Their escape is now imminent, arriving weeks earlier than expected, and within days, the miners will once again breathe fresh air and feel the desert sun on their faces. They will be able to eat birthday cake, hold their children, kiss their women on the lips. But these miners will not return to the lives they remember. When they descended down that hole, they were anonymous men, 33 out of thousands of miners trying to eke out a living chipping away at rock. This week, they will return to the world as celebrities.

Article Continued Below Never before have so many men survived being trapped underground for so long — nor has the world ever witnessed a rescue operation of such complexity and depth — one that has had a Canadian presence from the start. Half a century ago, trapped miners were considered lost causes. A caved-in mine would simply be sealed off and crosses would be hammered into the ground. Shortly after the Mina San Jose collapse on Thursday, Aug. 5, miners in the area were already placing wooden crosses outside its entrance, some hung with helmets and miners’ lamps. But for the rescue team, leaving those men to die in that hole was never an option. In today’s Chile — an economic superpower in South America with a multi-billion-dollar mining industry — there is no shortage of technology or resources available, and experts from around the world have united in the rescue effort. It has been a giant task, getting to the men trapped under 700 metres of granite. Hundreds have contributed, but one of the first to go after the miners was Raul Villegas. About 2 p.m. on that fateful day, Villegas had just finished filling his truck with rock when he heard a loud crack.

He was 600 metres below the surface and dust was filling the cavern but in that moment, Villegas was only faintly concerned — he was used to the sounds of crumbling rock and moaning earth. The mine, owned by a company called San Esteban, is notoriously dangerous in the mineral-rich region and, according to an official with the Chilean Safety Association, eight workers have died at the mine in 12 years. As Villegas ascended the spiralling ramps of the mine, he passed Frank Lobos, an ex-soccer player who was heading down the mine to fetch some men for lunch, and Mario Gomez, one of his oldest friends. Villegas joked with Lobos and mentioned the strange disturbances to Gomez but both men continued down the mine, disappearing into the darkness. Closer to the surface, a cloud of dust suddenly overtook Villegas’s truck, enveloping him in dirt and darkness. Just as he began to see the light at the surface, there was a massive collapse. “I felt an expansive wave, like when there is a dynamite explosion,” Villegas recalled. “The truck’s engine almost went off.” Villegas burst from the mine and into the glaring desert sun.

Looking back, he saw a huge cloud of dust streaming from the mine’s opening. It looked as though a volcano had erupted. Villegas reported the accident to his manager but it would be hours before they notified authorities. Villegas was sent down the mine along with some of the other mine workers but after descending about 400 metres, he realized the ramp was gone. Villegas could hear the hill groaning and he was frightened. About 700,000 tonnes of rock — more than six times the volume of all the concrete in Toronto’s CN Tower — had collapsed in the mine, cutting off ramps and destroying the mine’s ventilation shaft. It was later revealed that a ladder was missing from this shaft, which might have allowed the miners to escape. The Atacama region’s six-person special operations emergency squad was called in and entered the mine at 9 p.m., seven hours after the collapse. They would not emerge until 6 a.m. the next day — shaken, drenched in sweat and empty-handed. By the next morning, relatives and reporters had begun arriving on the site, demanding answers.

A handful of pirquineros, or independent miners, later showed up with shovels and machines, pledging to sacrifice their own lives to dig out the trapped men. After the special operations squad failed a second time to enter the mine, the Chilean government began to assemble its own rescue team. It recruited the help of Codelco, the state-owned mining company and the largest copper producer in the world. One of Codelco’s operations, El Teniente, is the world’s biggest underground mining operation and has experts trained for such emergencies. Two of El Teniente’s best men — engineer Andre Sougarret and Rene Aguilar, a risk management expert — were lent to the rescue operation full-time. The miners’ lives were now in their hands. The Codelco-led team would spend nearly a week trying to secure the mine for a final attempt at rescuing the men through the main opening. But rocks continued collapsing, at one point sending rescuers running from the tunnels, and geotechnical instruments confirmed the earth was not finished moving. That rescue strategy was abandoned. At the base of the mine, anguished relatives were distraught to see the fire trucks and ambulances on scene suddenly driving away.

But Codelco had a second plan hatching — there was another way to get the men out without using the mine’s main tunnel. Chile is a mining country and they would do what they always did when it came to extricating precious objects from deep inside the ground. They would drill. Days after the collapse, Báez was reading emails in his office at Codelco’s headquarters in Santiago, about 800 kilometres south of the Mina San Jose. When news of the accident broke, mining and drilling companies from around the world began contacting the Chilean government with offers of help or ideas on how the rescue could be conducted. Báez, Codelco’s corporate manager for underground mines, was asked to sift through the emails and find the one that held the answer. Báez estimates he received proposals from more than 25 companies in at least seven different countries. It was soon determined that there were nine drills available near the Mina San Jose that could be quickly mobilized and delivered to the site. They would punch 14-centimetre holes in the ground until one made contact with the miners. Rescuers had topography plans for the mine but Báez says much of the information was inaccurate.

The Mina San Jose, first exploited in 1889, is about 800 metres deep, the first 400 metres of it dug in the early 20th century. Much information has been lost along the way. It was predicted the miners had probably made their way to a refuge chamber 700 metres below the surface — comparatively, the CN Tower is about 550 metres tall. The nine drill rigs were set up in an arc formation, most pointing their drill bits toward that target. There was no real plan behind the drilling and 15 holes were ultimately pierced through the ground in a frantic, haphazard effort to reach the miners. Some drills encountered problems along the way; two were unable to dig deeper than 500 metres and another hit an unexpected cavern in the mine. Kelvin Brown, an Australian drilling expert who flew to Chile to assist, recalls the chaos of having nine drills pounding into the rocky terrain in such close proximity. “Everyone was trying very hard and very fast but it was a little bit hopeless in the early days,” Brown says. “It was just a real lot of people, too many people . . .

they just drilled very fast.” By that point, relatives of the miners had begun moving into a makeshift tent village at the entrance of the mine, dubbed Campamento Esperanza, or Camp Hope. As time wore on and despair deepened, the families had a standoff with the local police, or carabineros, frustrated by the slow pace of the rescue and demanding to be allowed on the site. “It was getting extremely tense outside the gates where the families were,” Brown says. “It became very heated and emotional and it was like a powder keg.” But the next morning, between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m., the rescue operation had its first breakthrough. Seventeen days after the collapse, one of the drills — a Schramm T685 operated by the Chilean company Terraservice — hit a cavernous space deep inside the mine. They knew the drill had hit an opening because the air pressure disappeared. The drill was turned off and lowered into the hole. Then, a distant tapping was felt on the end of the drill. As it was pulled back to the surface, rescuers were stunned to discover two notes tied to the probe. They were both written by Mario Gomez, the oldest of the miners.

One was addressed to his wife, Lilianett Ramirez; the other was a now infamous message that has been reproduced on T-shirts and billboards, written in red letters. It said: “Estamos bien en el refugio los 33,” or “we are fine in the refuge, all 33 of us.” The miners were alive, having survived on meagre rations of tuna and milk. But the question now was how they would be kept that way — and how they would get out. The initial drill holes — three of which ultimately reached the miners — were only 14 centimetres wide, just large enough to fit a grapefruit. Rescuers would need a hole of about 71 centimetres to hoist the men out. Báez had been doing research and learned of past rescue operations that used drills to reach trapped miners, who were then lifted out in rescue cages. This became the plan for the Mina San Jose miners, and rescuers decided they would need three drills working 24 hours a day. The drills were dubbed Plans A, B and C — if one failed, there would be two more keeping the rescue on track.

The miners had access to about two kilometres of galleries inside the mine and three targets were chosen for the drilling — the refuge chamber, a workshop in the mine and a ramp about 600 metres below ground. Each drill uses a different method. The Plan A drill, mainly used for creating ventilation shafts in underground mines, is known as a raise borer, meaning it drills a pilot hole first before using a reamer to widen the opening from the far end. The drill in Plan B is used for everything from mining to geothermal energy exploration and has a rotopercussion drilling system — one used in past rescue efforts. Plan C uses a massive drill rig from Alberta, designed primarily for oil and gas exploration. Never before have three such different drills worked side-by-side toward the same purpose. Ideally, once the rescue hole is drilled, the shaft will be encased with steel pipe, thus ensuring the safest possible journey back to the surface. Three metal rescue capsules were also manufactured by the Chilean navy to lift out the miners. Painted in the blue, white and red colours of the Chilean flag, the 419-kilogram capsules were dubbed “Phoenix.” It was an ambitious undertaking and there was plenty of room for mistakes.

The real challenge, rescuers knew, was only just beginning. Plan A Perched on the side of a mountain at the Mina San Jose is a white drill rig flying a Chilean flag. On the front, there is a brass plaque, the words “Strata 950” stamped across in red lettering. This is the drill for Plan A. Although set against the seemingly Martian landscape of the Atacama Desert, it resembles a small spaceship. The Strata 950 was the first drill recruited to assist with the rescue efforts. Shortly after the miners were discovered alive, a company called Terracem — a joint-venture between the Chilean-based drilling company Terraservice and an international engineering group named Cementation — presented rescuers with an idea. They had a powerful little machine capable of drilling in a perfectly straight line, reaming holes up to 1,000 metres deep and six metres wide. There are only five Strata 950s in the world, and this one happened to be in Chile already.

It is owned by a Canadian company, Cementation Canada Inc., but at the time of the mine collapse, it was working for a Codelco-owned copper mine called Andina, located some 80 kilometres northeast of Santiago. The drill was quickly mobilized and moved to the Mina San Jose. The team needed a site supervisor, someone familiar with this particular type of directional drill, and the man they wanted was Glen Fallon, a Cementation driller from North Bay, Ont. Fallon, a giant of a man who wears size 15 construction boots, was sitting in an underground mine in Timmins when he received the call from his boss. “Get your ass back to North Bay. You’re flying to Chile tomorrow,” he was told. Fallon arrived in Chile about a week after the miners were discovered alive. His crew, consisting of some South Africans and local Chileans, hit the ground running and hustled to set up the 28.5-tonne machine as quickly as possible. “It was very hectic when we first got here,” Fallon recalls. “It was, ‘Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up.’ ” Fallon found himself grappling with several challenges unique to this particular operation.

For one, the rig requires about 105 cubic metres of water to operate, both to lubricate the drilling process and to flush the rock cuttings back up to the surface. And water is not exactly easy to come by in the middle of a desert. Among the Strata’s biggest virtues is its ability to drill a perfectly straight hole. Because of this, the Plan A rig was placed directly over the miners’ refuge chamber — a spot that also happens to be on the side of a mountain. As the drill bores downwards, data is fed up to Fallon’s laptop every two minutes. He watches his screen intently and looks for zeroes — that means the drill is staying on track. Every so often the numbers deviate to 0.05 or 0.07, which indicates the drill has begun to wander off track. When this happens, a special apparatus behind the drill bit — called a rotary vertical drilling system — senses the deviation and pushes the drill bit back on track. The numbers always return to zero.

The Strata is a raise borer, which means it must drill twice — three drill bits are used create an initial pilot hole, about 38 centimetres in diameter, then that hole is widened to 72 centimetres by reaming from the bottom up. But of the three drill rigs, Plan A has had the farthest distance to dig, just under 702 metres. It has also been the slowest. When Plan B began the final widening of its 628-metre hole, Plan A was only at 320 metres of its initial pilot hole. “It works in a constant process, every day it’s going well,” said Rene Aguilar, the second-in-command of the rescue operation. “But the disadvantage is the time,” he adds. “We call it the turtle plan.” Another complication with the Strata is that it typically reams from the bottom to the top — after the pilot is drilled, the reaming head is brought to the bottom and attached to the end of a drill string so the loose rock falls down as the drill works its way up. But of course, it is impossible to get a full-sized reaming head down to the bottom of the Mina San Jose.

To solve this problem, a special reaming head was manufactured for the operation by Mining Technologies International in Sudbury, Ont. The custom tool’s components can be lowered down the pilot hole and assembled by the trapped miners below. Fallon has not been overly concerned by the pace of his drill. Slow and steady is the only way to go — his target, the refuge chamber, is not very large, about two metres by two and a half metres. Missing was not an option. “We will hit the target,” he said confidently a few weeks ago, lifting up a finger and moving it downwards in one swift, straight line. “Guaranteed we will hit the target. We will.” The self-professed control freak — nicknamed the Crazy Canuck at the Mina San Jose — runs a tight ship, and when he hears a strange rattling in one of the water pumps, he stops talking mid-sentence and briskly walks over, running a hand along one of the pipes like a concerned rancher checking a horse’s leg. When a cameraman from one of the many documentary crews covering the rescue operation stuck his head inside a piece of machinery, Fallon had him kicked out and restricted future access to media.

“I’ve been told I’m a bit intimidating,” he says with a wry grin. Fallon insists there has been no competition between Plan A and the other two drills. At the end of the day, there are 33 beating hearts at the bottom of his hole. “The first people to get these people out, I’ll be the first to shake their hand,” he said. “It’s very humbling to be involved in this.” PLAN B After initial contact was made with the miners in August, two of the three small drill holes were converted into lifelines for the trapped men. For the past two months, two of these those holes have been used to send materials and food down to the miners in plastic tubes nicknamed palomas, or doves. Everything the miners need to survive has had to fit through those 14-centimetre openings. One of the palomas is used for piping water and oxygen into the mine; it has also been threaded with telephone lines and a fibre-optic cable for video conferencing.

According to the lead psychologist, Alberto Iturra, some 250 psychiatric experts have contributed to keeping the miners sane, and a doctor from the Chilean army has also been training the men for their final rescue, playing them exercise videos that demonstrate squats and lunges. The miners are also building their pulmonary resistance, singing as they exercise, so doctors will know when they are running short on breath. The second paloma hole is being used to send down food. The meals have been carefully planned by a nutritionist with the Chilean health ministry in Santiago and the miners are maintaining a diet of about 2,500 calories per day to keep them trim enough for the final rescue. The third hole that reached the miners in August has become the basis for the Plan B drill, a Schramm T-130. This drill, owned by the Chilean mining company GeoTech, has been typically used for drilling deep-water wells. It arrived at the Mina San Jose from Collahuasi, one of the biggest copper mines in Chile. If Plan A has been the turtle, Plan B has been the hare.

A special drill system has been brought in for the Schramm T-130, one that uses a cluster of five pistons and bits in a single drill head, all working together to pulverize the ground at 1,500 blows per minute. The drill is like a “glorified jackhammer,” according to Brandon Fisher, founder and president of Pennsylvania-based Center Rock Inc., which manufactures the system. This is not the first rescue mission Fisher has been involved with. When he first heard that the Chilean rescue operation might take until Christmas, Fisher got on the Internet and began researching — what were the depths, the rock type, the geological conditions of the Mina San Jose? Fisher was convinced his company could help the rescue move quicker. In 2002, Centre Rock was involved in a mission to rescue nine miners who were trapped underground for more than 77 hours at the Quecreek mine in Pennsylvania. In some ways, the Quecreek mission was similar to the Mina San Jose operation — drills were used to create rescue holes for the trapped miners, who were ultimately pulled from the ground in rescue cages. But at Quecreek, the trapped miners were only about 60 metres below the surface.

At the Mina San Jose, Plan B is aiming for a workshop in the mine that is 628 metres below ground. Still, Fisher felt he could pull the rescue off and cobbled together a PowerPoint presentation explaining his drilling system. Rescue organizers were sold and Fisher arrived in Chile on Sept. 4. Plan B had an automatic advantage because its pilot hole was already in place by the time it started work. But because the final diameter must be so large, the hole had to be widened in two steps; first to 30 centimetres and then again to 71. When Plan B finished its initial widening on Sept. 17, the miners — who have organized themselves into three work shifts — began contributing to the operation by using a front-end loader underground to remove the rock cuttings that drop to the bottom. For all its speed, however, Plan B has also encountered the most problems of the three drills. It has the curviest trajectory — the hole is shaped like a rainbow near the top and becomes progressively more vertical as it deepens. Because of the angles, the first 300 metres of drilling were riddled with problems.

In the second week of September, Plan B’s drill also hit a reinforcement beam in the mine and shattered its bit. The chunk had to be fished out before drilling could continue — a process that involved estimating the angle of the drill bit and then designing the necessary tools to grab it out. In the United States, fishing out that broken piece would have taken one or two days, Fisher says. In Chile, it required five, mainly because equipment had to be sent in from the States. Fisher has been working around the clock at the Plan B site, sometimes going three days without returning to his hotel for a shower. He says the Chilean government is paying for his time and equipment — “that’s the plan anyway.” But he is not at the Mina San Jose for the money. He is there for the miners. “I don’t know that there’s 10 minutes that you’re out here that you don’t look down there and think, ‘There’s 33 guys 600 feet below our feet,’ ” he said. “Whenever you’re tired, it’s real easy to think, ‘Hey, I’m out here seeing sunlight and breathing fresh air.

It’s time to suck it up and get these guys out of here.’ ” PLAN C In the mining town of Copiapó, about 45 minutes from the Mina San Jose, is a hotel called Las Pircas. For the past several weeks, its dining room has been transformed into something that resembles a northern Alberta pub. Every day, for breakfast and supper, a few dozen men trickle into the dining room wearing Oilers caps or Calgary Flames sweatshirts. They smoke and drink coffee and talk with distinctly Canadian accents. This is the Plan C crew, a team of about a dozen Canadians working on an oil and gas exploration rig owned by Calgary-based Precision Drilling Corp. The machine, called a Rig 421, was the third and final drill to arrive for the rescue dig. A Chilean company, ENAP, is spearheading the Plan C operation and Schlumberger, the world’s largest oilfield services provider, was contracted to design the well. But Precision has supplied the equipment and the men, all of whom were hand-selected by Shaun Robstad, a Precision field superintendent from Okotoks, Alta., just outside of Calgary.

Robstad first caught wind of the fact that Precision might be assisting with the Chilean rescue three days before the miners were discovered alive. A week later, he was en route to South America. This is not Robstad’s first trip to Chile. In 2007, Precision shipped a 39-metre-high rig from Sundre, Alta., to Iquique, a port city in northern Chile. Robstad accompanied the drill rig, which was brought down to explore for gas. After two unsuccessful attempts, the rig was packed up and placed in storage. “That’s where it sat until I got the call to come here,” Robstad says. But when Robstad arrived in northern Chile to retrieve the rig, he discovered several parts had been stolen. All of the electrical cables were missing, as well as some beams. Most of the copper — Chile’s most precious commodity — had been stripped. In any case, Robstad and his men packed up the massive rig and drove it 1,102 kilometres to the Mina San Jose. The journey required two days and 46 trucks.

To get on the work site, the caravan of trucks first had to pass through Camp Hope, the tent village that has sprung up at the base of the mine. The makeshift camp has amassed a startling amount of infrastructure, complete with a cafeteria, a school and even free Wi-Fi Internet service. It is a bizarre little universe where local mining families commingle with international journalists from as far away as Germany and Japan. Every time a new piece of rescue equipment is delivered to the Mina San Jose, it is received with great fanfare. But the Precision Drill was perhaps the most anticipated addition to the ongoing rescue efforts, and when it arrived on site, people rushed from their tents and greeted the rig with applause and cheers. The Chilean president also attended the unveiling of the Precision drill, shaking Robstad’s hand and asking, “Who’s going to get there first?” “It received a lot of hype, that’s for sure,” Robstad says. “The locals had a nickname for it, the Transformer.

It comes here in pieces and then you put it together and the next thing you know, you see the giant mast going up in the air.” The machine is indeed the largest of the three drills, requiring an area the size of a soccer field, about 70 metres by 110 metres — though even that is far too small a workspace, Robstad says. The diesel-electric drill rig is powered by three generators and referred to as a “triple,” both because of its mast height and the drill’s ability to lift three joints of nine-metre-long pipe onto the drilling floor at a time. The drill is spun by a 95-centimetre rotary table and can hit depths of about 3,200 metres — though usually it doesn’t drill holes as wide as those required for this rescue. Nonetheless, Plan C had a speed advantage because it didn’t need a pilot hole — it could drill the final diameter in just one go. The Precision drill’s challenge, however, has been to manoeuvre around an underground gallery before heading toward its target, a ramp 598 metres below the ground.

This means Plan C had to drill vertically for the first 40 metres, after which it began boring at a seven degree angle. Like the other drills, Plan C is staffed by two full crews 24 hours a day. An electrician and mechanic are always on site, standing by in case something goes wrong. Like the other two drills, Plan C has had its good and bad moments. Some days, it can drill 50 metres; on others, it only clears 12. “We’re getting lots of criticism saying we’re slow . . . but you have to remember it’s a big hole,” Robstad said. “You’re trying to steer it, you’re trying to get it the right way. People thought we were going to come in here and drill 100 metres, 1,000 metres a day.” Robstad is mindful of the fact that the entire country — and much of the world — has been scrutinizing his work on the drill. Every so often, his men take a break and go out in Copiapó but Robstad has imposed a strict no-drinking rule. “I don’t want my guys showing up on the front page of the paper,” he said.

Robstad insists the only pressure he feels is from himself. And when he calls home to his 11-year-old girl, McKenzie, she always asks: “When are you going to get them out?” Every morning, the Plan C crew meets inside its office on site to discuss the progress overnight and the plan for the new day. Inevitably, someone will mention the miners. “It comes up every day: ‘I wonder what it’s like down there,’ ” Robstad said. “I don’t think they went to work that day thinking they wouldn’t be getting out.” In Camp Hope, family members cheered, cried and waved Chilean flags. On the drill site, Champagne was sprayed and hard hats tumbled off as rescue workers hugged each other and shouted for joy. It will still be days before the miners can be lifted out, however, and rescue planners are now determining whether the hole will be cased with steel pipe. Plan B was always going to be the most difficult hole to encase, thanks to its winding trajectory.

Seventy-two sections of steel pipe have been shipped to the Mina San Jose but according to a source, who was not authorized to speak on the record, GeoTech will likely bring in its own steel piping, which is manufactured slightly thinner and is easier to bend. The tentative plan is to encase the top 70 metres of the hole only, the source said. When it comes time to hoist the 33 men up, a medic will descend into the hole to assess their condition. It has not been revealed yet in what order they will be rescued, but the likely scenario is that the strongest miner will go first, followed by the weakest, and then the rest will follow. The shift leader at the time of the collapse, foreman Luis Urzua, is expected to come up last. The men will be hoisted up wearing Oakley sunglasses to protect their eyes from the blazing sunlight. After stepping foot on the surface, they will be treated initially in a field hospital, reuniting briefly with up to three relatives, and then flying by helicopter to a hospital in Copiapó, where they will remain for at least 48 hours.

Industry insiders say the disaster at the Mina San Jose will change the mining industry in Chile forever. Since the collapse, top officials with the country’s mining regulating body have been sacked and dozens of small mines have been shut down. The sensational rescue operation has also captured Chile’s imagination and united the country behind a common cause. The country’s president and its mining minister, Laurence Golborne, have both seen their approval ratings skyrocket since the disaster. Ongoing investigations continue to examine what caused the collapse at the Mina San Jose but early reports suggest support structures were weakened by overzealous mining. Families have already launched lawsuits against the company, as well as the government. Nobody knows what will become of the mine after everything is over, but rescue planner Rene Aguilar thinks it should be shut down permanently. The gigantic piece of rock that caused the collapse is still perched in the mine at a precarious angle and could fall again. “It could happen in the next five minutes or the next two years, nobody knows,” he said. Like the hundreds of others who have been involved in the rescue on this dusty stretch of desert, Aguilar has put his life on hold for these 33 men.

He has not left the mine area since he arrived after the collapse and Aguilar has had little time to tend to his full-time work at El Teniente or to his wife, who is pregnant with their fourth child. But the significance of what they are on the cusp of accomplishing is not lost on him. “We feel we’re doing the job for those miners, their families, our country,” Aguilar says quietly. “I think we are making history here.” With files from Associated Press Chilean miners trapped in San Jose mine - Telegraph Chile Chilean miners trapped in San Jose mine A group of 33 miners from the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile were trapped 2,297 feet underground for 69 days after the mine collapsed on 5 August, 2010. Here's an infographic of the effort to save them.

Telegraph on Facebook Trapped in a Chilean mine - Photos - The Big Picture - Boston.com Trapped in a Chilean mine Over a month ago, on August 5, 2010, the roof of the San Jose copper and gold mine collapsed, trapping 33 miners inside, 700 meters (2,300 ft) below ground near Copiapo, Chile. The fate of the miners was not immediately known - it took 17 days before a drill reached their refuge, discovering them alive and well. Rescue work began immediately, but even with several concurrent plans underway, the quickest likely rescue will still take two to three months. Until then, the 33 men will have to endure high temperatures and humidity in isolated conditions. A video link has been established, many relatives have set up camp nearby, and food, air, messages and supplies are delivered by several narrow boreholes. Fluorescent lights with timers are to be sent down to attempt to keep the men on a normal schedule by imitating day and night as they care for each other and assist in their own rescue. Once it reaches them, the diameter of the rescue borehole will be very narrow.

so each miner will have to ensure they have a waistline of no more than 90 cm (35 in) to escape. ( 42 photos total ) Relatives wait outside a collapsed mine where about 33 miners are trapped in Copiapo, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 14, 2010. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo) All 33 Chilean miners rescued - World - CBC News All 33 Chilean miners rescued 6 rescue workers also brought to the surface Chilean miners face mental, physical trauma Celebrations erupted Wednesday night as the last of the 33 miners trapped in a Chilean mine for more than two months was rescued. The last man to emerge from the ground was shift foreman Luis Urzua, whose leadership was credited with helping the men endure the initial 17 days after the Aug. 5 mine collapse, during which they had no outside contact. Sirens and horns blared and people cheered as Urzua arrived in the 190-by-54-centimetre metal capsule that brought the men to the surface.

The last miner to be rescued, Luis Urzua, centre, raises an arm as Chilean President Sebastian Pinera, right, looks on after his rescue from the collapsed mine. ((Alex Ibanez, Chilean Presidential Press Office/Associated Press)) "We have done what the entire world was waiting for," Urzua said to Chilean President Sebastian Pinera after his rescue. "The 70 days that we fought so hard were not in vain. We had strength, we had spirit, we wanted to fight, we wanted to fight for our families, and that was the greatest thing." Urzua, Pinera and the rescuers then began singing the Chilean national anthem. In Canada, Prime Minister Stephen Harper offered congratulations to the rescued miners and their families. "Today we join the rest of the world in celebrating the best possible outcome: the successful rescue of the miners who returned to their loved ones safe and sound," Harper said in a statement. Operation went smoothly As the rescue operation proceeded smoothly Wednesday, the time required to bring the miners up individually from the tunnel where they were trapped more than 600 metres underground took just 25 minutes each.

The operation went so quickly that Urzua was out by 8:55 p.m. ET. Earlier estimates were that it would take until the end of Wednesday to get all the miners out. Ariel Ticona, the 32nd miner pulled from the mine, will get to meet his new child. His wife gave birth to a daughter, their second, while Ticona was trapped. Franklin Lobos was the 27th miner brought to the surface. A 53-year-old retired professional soccer player, Lobos kicked a soccer ball given to him after he stepped from the rescue capsule. Jose Henriquez, a 55-year-old father of two, was the 24th man pulled out. A religious man, he had led prayer groups in the mine and had friends send 33 bibles down the rescue shaft. A rescuer, left, helps Victor Segovia Rojas after he's brought to the surface at the San Jose gold and copper mine, near Copiapo, Chile, on Wednesday. After all the miners were above ground, the six rescue workers sent down to provide assistance followed them up.

Yonni Barios, 50, was the 21st miner rescued. He had taken a nursing course previously and was known as the doctor down below because he helped so many fellow miners with their health problems. Over the roughly 70 days the men spent trapped in the mine, Barios took temperatures, administered medications and treated minor skin infections. Barios hugged his mistress after emerging from the capsule. His wife told a Chilean newspaper she would not be at the mine to greet her husband because she had reportedly found out about his mistress. Mario Sepulveda Espina, the second miner to reach the surface, told a Chilean television station the ordeal was the hardest thing he has ever faced in his life, but his faith in God got him through it. "I was with God, and I was with the devil," he said through a translator. "But God won, I held on to God's hand, the best hand, and at no point in time ... did I doubt that God would get me out of there." The first rescue began at 10:55 p.m.

ET Tuesday, when Florencio Avalos, 31, was raised through a shaft while strapped inside the metal capsule, dubbed Phoenix 1. After weeks of waiting and preparation, it took just 16 minutes to lift him out of the mine. "His seven-year-old son and his wife were waiting beside the rescue capsule," Connie Watson of CBC News said from Chile. Miner Osman Araya reunites with his wife Wednesday after becoming the sixth trapped miner to reach the surface of the San Jose mine. ((Hugo Infante/Government of Chile/Reuters)) "Before it got there, the son was just sobbing and sobbing, and that had almost everyone else feeling the same." Avalos, who often acted as a videographer after officials sent cameras down a tunnel, greeted his family and hugged his rescuers and the Chilean president before being escorted into a medical triage centre set up on site. "He looked in really good shape," Watson said early Wednesday morning. "It was the start of what's been a very successful process." The tightly choreographed rescue operation proceeded without any major issues as officials monitored the situation closely as the miners were lifted out one by one.

Panic and stress attacks among the miners were among the rescuers' main concerns, but there were also fears that falling rocks could have wedged the escape capsule in the rescue shaft. Record survival time The miners were winched more than 600 metres to the surface through a narrow shaft, which took weeks to drill. They survived more time trapped underground than anyone on record, and the world was captivated by their endurance and unity as officials carefully planned their rescue. Before the rescue operation began, crews ran tests by lowering an empty capsule down the shaft and raising it before sending it back down with a rescue worker inside to help prepare the miners for their trip to the surface. Rescued from mine: Chilean Mine Rescue Fast Facts - CNN.com Here's a look at the 2010 rescue of 33 miners from a collapsed mine in the Atacama region of northern Chile. Timeline: August 5, 2010 - A collapse of the main ramp into the San Jose mine leaves 33 miners trapped 2,300 feet underground. Emergency officials are unable to communicate with the trapped miners.

August 6, 2010 - A statement from Chile's National Emergency Office says 130 people are working to rescue the miners. August 7, 2010 - Rescuers face a setback when another cave-in blocks the path they were using to reach the miners. Chilean President Sebastian Pinera travels to Copiapo, where the mine is located, to meet with officials. August 22, 2010 - The miners send a note up tied to a probe which was lowered by authorities earlier in the day. Written in red ink, it reads, "We are fine in the shelter, the 33 of us." Read More August 23, 2010 - A second probe reaches the miners. Rescuers are now capable of relaying communications and can send food and water to miners. Before this, the miners survive by sharing small amounts of tuna and mackerel that were in the shelter, along with water. August 24, 2010 - Experts from NASA and Chilean navy submarine experts are called to help address the psychological toll the isolation can take on the miners.

August 26, 2010 - Miners send a video message to their families expressing thanks for the efforts under way to free them. August 27, 2010 - Miners are told for the first time of the lengthy process rescuers expect it will take to extract them from the mine. Officials announce that they are working on a "Plan B", which could help speed up the rescue process. August 29, 2010 - Each of the trapped miners is given about 20 seconds to speak directly with family members for the first time since the accident. August 31, 2010 - Plan A drilling starts. September 3, 2010 - The Schramm T-130 drill, otherwise known as Plan B, arrives at the rescue scene. The drill is usually used for boring water holes. September 6, 2010 - Rescue officials temporarily stop the Plan B initial drill due to a damaged drill bit. September 9, 2010 - Miners record a new video to show their families a glimpse of what their routines are like. The three-minute clip shows them in good spirits.

September 14, 2010 - Elizabeth Segovia, wife of trapped miner Ariel Ticona, gives birth to a girl she names Esperanza, Spanish for hope. September 17, 2010 - The Plan B bore hole reaches the 33 miners. However, the hole is only 12 inches wide and will need to be widened on a second pass. September 22, 2010 - The Plan C drill starts drilling. September 25, 2010 - The rescue capsule expected to haul the miners back to the surface arrives at the mine. Named the Phoenix, it's painted red, white and blue - the colors of the Chilean flag. September 28, 2010 - The Plan B drill passes the halfway point to the trapped miners. September 30, 2010 - Rescue crews successfully test the capsule. One test subject declares it "comfortable." October 1, 2010 - Mining Minister Laurence Golborne announces that officials expect to reach the miners as early as mid October - sooner than previously expected. Crews could reach the miners between October 15 and October 30.

Officials earlier predict the date might be as far away as November or Christmas. October 5, 2010 - Rescuers say they are within 160 meters of the trapped miners. October 6, 2010 - Two additional capsules and a winch, a device used for winding and tension adjustments, arrive at the mine site. October 7, 2010 - A source close to rescue operations says the Plan B drill is now less than 100 meters from the target. October 9, 2010 - The Plan B drill breaks through the roof of the mine. October 12, 2010 - During a press conference, Mining Minister Golborne announces that the rescue is expected to begin during "the last quarter" of the day. October 13, 2010 - The first miner rescued, Florencio Antonio Avalos Silva, 31, reaches the surface at about 12:11 a.m. ET.

Shift foreman Luis Alberto Urzua Iribarren, 54, is the 33rd and final miner to be rescued, approximately 22 1/2 hours after the rescue operation begins. July 25, 2011 - Representatives for the rescued miners announce that the official and authorized film rights to their story have been sold to producer Mike Medavoy. August 30, 2011 - Fourteen of the miners are awarded lifetime monthly pensions of 250,000 Chilean pesos (approximately $540), by Cecilia Morel, Chile's first lady. The government chose which miners would receive the lifetime pensions based on health, age and the opinion of the group of survivors. August 1 2013 - Chilean prosecutors announce they have closed the investigation into the mining disaster without filing any charges. August 4, 2013 - San Esteban Mining Company agrees to sell the now-closed San Jose mine to pay the miners and reimburse the Chilean government for the cost of rescue efforts, in addition to paying the company's other debts.

Miners: Chilean Mine Collapse | Fox News World Chilean Mine Collapse After more than 66 days 1,000 feet below ground, the 33 Chilean miners and their families wait for a drill to finish sculpting a rescue shaft through the last layers of rock. Miners to Be Freed Oct. 9: Jeff Hart, the T-130 drill operator from Denver, Colorado, left, embraces Elizabeth Segovia, sister of trapped miner Dario Segovia Rojo, at the San Jose Mine near Copiapo, Chile. (AP) miners-to-be-freed Workers Celebrate Oct. 9: Workers of the T 130 drilling machine react after completing an escape hole for the 33 trapped miners at San Jose mine near Copiapo city. workers-celebrate Workers Celebrate Oct. 9: Mining officials and personnel involved in the rescue operation of 33 trapped miners wave to the press after a drill successfully reached the miners at the San Jose Mine near Copiapo, Chile. (AP) workers-celebrate Family Member Celebrates Oct.

9: A relative of the 33 miners trapped deep underground in a copper and gold mine is hugged by a policeman after the T 130 drilling machine completed an escape hole for the 33 miners that are trapped deep underground at San Jose mine near Copiapo city. (Reuters) family-member-celebrates Family Member Celebrates Oct. 9: Elizabeth Segovia, sister of Dario Segovia, one of the 33 miners trapped deep underground from an accident on August 5 at San Jose mine, meets with the T 130 drilling machine operators U.S Jeff Heart (L) and Matt Staffel after completing the escape hole for the miners near Copiapo city. (Reuters) family-member-celebrates Camp for Miners' Relatives Oct. 8: An illuminated balloon hovers over the camp were relatives of a trapped miners wait for news of the rescue effort near the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile. (AP) camp-for-miners'-relatives Waiting for the Rescue Oct. 8: Ezequiel Rivera hugs his daughter at the camp were relatives of a trapped miners wait for news of the rescue effort.

Drillers neared the lower reaches of a gold and copper mine where 33 men have been trapped for more than two months. (AP) waiting-for-the-rescue Meeting With the Relatives Oct. 8: Chile's First Lady Cecilia Morel, center, drinks mate, an herbal tea, as she meets with the relatives of trapped miners at a camp near at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile. (AP) meeting-with-the-relatives Waiting for the Rescue Oct. 8: Elizabeth Segovia, sister of trapped miner Dario Segovia, sits a the camp where relatives wait for the rescue of the miners outside the San Jose mine, Copiapo, Chile. Chile's mining minister says that just 130 feet remain before a drill breaks through to reach the chamber in the collapsed gold and copper mine. (AP) waiting-for-the-rescue Working Towards Rescue Oct. 8: Chile's Health Minister Jaime Manalich, left, Atacama region mining official Ximena Matas, second from left, and Chile's Minister of Mining, Laurence Golborne, center, inspect a module that will be used for the initial reunion between rescued miners with their relatives at the San Jose Mine near Copiapo, Chile.

Engineers and rescue workers continue working to get to the 33 trapped miners who have waited for more than two months to be rescued. Other people in the photo are unidentified. (AP) working-towards-rescue Vigil for Trapped Miners Oct. 7: A relative of one of the 33 miners trapped lights a candle during a vigil outside the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile. The miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) vigil-for-trapped-miners School for Miners' Children Oct. 7: Children play outside a makeshift school room set up for children of 33 trapped miners at the San Jose mine near Copiapo, Chile. (AP) school-for-miners'-children Chilean Miner Talks to Family In this photos provided by Chile's government, trapped miner Claudio Yanez talks to his relatives during a video conference at the collapsed San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, Saturday, Sept. 4, 2010. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5.

(AP) chilean-miner-talks-to-family Chilean Miners' Video In this TV grab taken from a video released by Chile's government on Tuesday, Aug. 31, miners react inside the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) chilean-miners'-video Chilean Miners' Video In this TV grab taken from a video released by the government of Chile on Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2010, a miner trapped at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, holds a Chilean flag. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) chilean-miners'-video Chilean Miners Get Supplies In this TV grab taken from a video released by Chile's government on Tuesday, Aug. 31, miners receive supplies, sent to them through a pipe from the surface, inside the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5.

(AP) chilean-miners-get-supplies Chilean Miners' Video In this photos provided by Chile's Presidency, trapped miner, Mario Sepulveda, left, speaks to a miner, right, during a video conference at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, Saturday, Sept. 4, 2010. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) chilean-miners'-video Chilean Rescue Operation Workers prepare a tool to be used in the rescue operation of miners at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, Thursday, Sept. 2, 2010. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) chilean-rescue-operation Chilean Mine Drill Men work on a new drill being used in the rescue operation of miners at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, Thursday, Sept. 2, 2010. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. (AP) chilean-mine-drill Fuerza Mineros!

Cookers fry fish outside the collapsed San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, Saturday, Sept. 4, 2010. Thirty-three miners have been trapped deep underground in the copper and gold mine since it collapsed on Aug. 5. The graffiti at the wall behind reads in Spanish: "Be strong, miners". (AP) fuerza-mineros! "We Are Ok" August 22: Chilean President Sebastian Pinera holds up a plastic bag containing a message from the 33 miners trapped saying, "We are OK in the refuge". (AP) (AP) "we-are-ok" Depth_Reached August 22: Relatives of several miners trapped in the collapsed mine react after being informed that one of the drill machines being used in the rescue effort has reached the depth where the miners are located. (AP) (AP) depth_reached Relatives_Wait August 6: Relatives wait as rescuers scramble to dig out 33 copper workers trapped inside the San Jose mine in Copiapo, in northern Chile. Miners are trapped nearly 1,000 feet below ground after a tunnel caved in.

(AP) (AP) relatives_wait Officials_Speak_to_Miners_Families August 7: Chile's Mining Minister Laurence Golborne speaks to relatives and journalists outside the collapsed mine in Copaipo, Chile. Search groups suspended their hunt for the 33 workers after a new collapse occurred. (AP) (AP) officials_speak_to_miners_families Rescue_Efforts_Continue August 7: Miners, relatives and rescue workers stand outside a collapsed copper mine during a rescue effort for 33 trapped in Copiapo, Chile. (AP) (AP) rescue_efforts_continue Still_Trapped August 9: A drill machine is being used to try and contact the 33 trapped miners is seen in from a distance in Copiapo, Chile. (AP) (AP) still_trapped Outside_the_Mine August 13: Relatives and co-workers place Chilean flags outside the collapsed mine where 33 miners have been trapped for more than a week. (AP) (AP) outside_the_mine Mass August 10: Relatives and miners attend a Mass outside the collapsed mine in Copiapo, Chile.

(AP) (AP) Chile's rescued miners case dropped Chile's rescued miners case dropped Luis Andres Henao, Associated Press Pin it Share FILE - In this Oct. 13, 2010 file photo of a screen grab taken from video, rescuers inside the San Jose Mine near Copiapo, Chile, hold a sign that reads "Mission Complete" after all 33 trapped miners were rescued. A Chilean prosecutor has ended a probe of possible responsibility for the mine collapse that trapped the 33 men for more than two months in 2010, and the rescued miners expressed anger at the decision on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2013. (AP Photo, File) More SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) -- The inquiry into the mine collapse that trapped 33 men for more than two months in 2010 has ended with no charges filed, a result that drew angry responses Thursday from the rescued miners. The cave-in at the San Jose mine in the Atacama desert brought the mine's safety record into focus and put mining, Chile's top industry, under close scrutiny.

The decision by a prosecutor in the northern region of Atacama to bring no charges against mine owners Alejandro Bohn and Marcelo Kemmeny, or Chile's Mining Ministry's regulatory unit, was announced late Wednesday after a three-year investigation. "This is a disgrace to Chile's justice system," Mario Sepulveda, who became the public face of the miners, told The Associated Press. "It's impossible that in an accident of this magnitude no one is held responsible," Sepulveda said. "Today, I want to dig a deep hole and bury myself again; only this time, I don't want anybody to find me." The miners said it felt like an earthquake when the shaft caved in above them on Aug. 5, 2010, filling the lower parts of the copper and gold mine with dust. Hours passed before they could even begin to see a few steps in front of them. Tons of rock shifted constantly above, threatening to bury them forever. People on the surface didn't know for more than two weeks that the men had survived, and the 33 miners stretched a meager 48-hour store of emergency food for 17 days, eating tiny capsules of tuna and sips of expired milk.

A narrow shaft finally was drilled into their haven and the world learned they were alive. That shaft allowed food and water to reach the men while rescuers drilled a bigger escape hole. Finally, in an operation that ended in the early hours of Oct. 13, the miners were hauled up one by one in a cage through 2,000 feet (600 meters) of rock. Renato Prenafeta, a lawyer for 31 of the 33 miners, said his legal team will review the background that led to the prosecutor's decision and present its own arguments. Prenafeta has also filed a civil suit asking for compensation for the harm and damage suffered by the miners over the past three years. "Most of the people I represent are still suffering from serious psychological consequences," Prenafeta said. "Many can't even work. It's a very dramatic situation." The miners received a hero's welcome after their globally televised rescue. They received paid trips to the Greek Islands, visited the Real Madrid stadium in Spain and paraded at Magic Kingdom in Disney World. But their fantasy began to crumble on their return home.

Many ran out of money and had to scratch out a living in the dusty working class neighborhoods of the desert city of Copiapo. Some began suffering from health and psychological problems. Others took to alcohol and drugs. "I'm upset by this decision," said Omar Reygadas, one of the rescued miners who is now unemployed. "Most mine owners are afraid to hire us because they think that if there's ever a problem everyone will immediately find out about it since we get a lot press. We're well known." President Sebastian Pinera supervised the 22-hour rescue of the miners and their survival story sent his popularity ratings soaring. Minutes after all the miners were safe on the surface, he vowed that those responsible would be held accountable. A Chilean congressional commission in 2011 found the owners of the 125-year-old mine responsible for the cave-in. "Because we're part of the government, we can't give our opinion on these decisions, but we obviously hope the civil suit stays on the right track so they can get compensation," Mining Minister Hernan de Solminihac, told state TV.

"Most importantly, we continue to stand behind the 33." Mining-related deaths in Chile fell 36 percent in 2011 to 27, compared to 41 in 2010, the year of the cave-in, according to a report by the Mining Ministry. The report says that thanks to increased oversight by inspectors, accidents at the country's 8,500 mines also fell by 40 percent in 2011, the lowest level in 21 years. __ Luis Andres Henao on Twitter: Reblog

Question: Name the mine in Copiapo, Chile, where 33 miners were trapped after a collapse on 5 Aug 2010?
Answer: San José