The Miners Were Rescued!

Fenix II Capsule

On October 15, 2010 at 12:00 am and after more than two months of waiting, the miners who were trapped in the San Jose Mine in Chile, started to be rescued in a thirty-six or fourty-eight hour-planned process. The engineers team, helped by NASA specialists, built three fifty-four centimeters of diameter's capsules with eight wheels, called Fenix I, II and III, were the miners had to go in to be extracted from the bottom of the earth.



Miners on the cave to be rescued


This last week miners had a special diet to fit in it: two spoons of tuna and a little glass of water every two days. When the plan started, the rescue team sent three paramedic people in the Fenix II capsule to check vital signs of each miner and sent up first, the strongest ones who were in charge of transmitting what they were seeing, doing easier the path for coming ones; then the ones who had any health problem, and then the ones in regular conditions.



First rescued miner and the president

Every movement, up or down, was taking between sixteen and twenty minutes, but then the process was faster, mostly when no one was going down. At the end, the thirty-three miners were rescued in less than twenty-four hours, doing of this an unique and extraordinary rescue that left a big trace in the history of the world.  The chilean president and his wife were supporting the miners families in every step of the process while they were waiting for the miner in the capsule. 


Second rescued miner

Although seeing a new miner "borning from the earth" was a motivation moment, some cases were special, such as the first miner whose son was really excited to see his father after a long time; the second miner who brought rocks for gifts to the rescue team and the chilean president and used his last energy to motivate people to sing with him about patriotic feelings; and finally the last miner who closed the moment singing with the whole people the chilean anthem as the end of the suffering they and their families had for sixty-nine days. One more special moment that paparazzi's were waiting for was the time when the miner with wife and girlfriend was coming out, but even his wife was happy to see he was ok, whe never showed up, instead, his girlfriend went to show him her support.