Beaconsfield mine collapse
Encyclopedia
Beaconsfield, Tasmania
Beaconsfield is a town near the Tamar River, in the north-east of Tasmania, Australia. It lies 40 kilometres north of Launceston on the West Tamar Highway. It is part of the Municipality of West Tamar...
, Tasmania
Tasmania
Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. Of the 17 people who were in the mine at the time, 14 escaped immediately following the collapse, one was killed and the remaining two were found alive using a remote-controlled device. These two miners were rescued on 9 May 2006, two weeks after being trapped nearly a kilometre below the surface.
Mine collapse
At 9:26 p.m. (Australian Eastern Standard TimeTime in Australia
Australia uses Standard time, i.e: the same well defined time for a region. The proper names of Australia's time zones are Australian Western Standard Time , Australian Central Standard Time , and Australian Eastern Standard Time...
) on 25 April 2006 a small earthquake triggered an underground rock fall at the Beaconsfield gold mine in northern Tasmania. Geoscience Australia
Geoscience Australia
Geoscience Australia is an agency of the Australian federal government. It carries out geoscientific research.On a user pays basis it produces geospatial products such as topographic maps and satellite imagery.-History:...
said that the earthquake had a magnitude of 2.2, at a shallow depth at coordinates 41.190°S 146.840°E. Earlier speculation had suggested that mine blasting had caused the collapse. Three of the miners working underground at the time were trapped, and early reports suggested that 14 miners who were underground at the time had managed to scramble to safety. The mining company, Beaconsfield Mine Joint Venture, released a press statement saying they held "grave concerns for the three miners' wellbeing".
Telescopic handler
A telescopic handler, or telehandler, is a machine widely used in agriculture and industry. It is similar in appearance and function to a forklift but is more a crane than forklift, with the increased versatility of a single telescopic boom that can extend forwards and upwards from the vehicle...
or telehandler. They were in a basket at the end of the telehandler's arm, where they had been applying steel mesh to a barricade prior to backfilling a stope. It was initially misreported that the two miners were saved by a slab of rock that fell on top of the basket, however in a Channel 9 exclusive interview broadcast on 21 May, Webb and Russell stated that this was incorrect and that the "ceiling" above them was merely thousands of individual unstable rocks precariously packed together.
The cage was partially filled with rock, and the men were partially buried under some rubble. Webb seemed to have been knocked unconscious for a short time, and Russell's lower body was completely buried. When Webb awoke, the two were able to free themselves and each other from the fallen rock by cutting through their clothes and boots, which were stuck in the rock, using stanley knives
Utility knife
A utility knife is a knife used for general or utility purposes. The utility knife was originally a fixed blade knife with a cutting edge suitable for general work such as cutting hides and cordage, scraping hides, butchering animals, cleaning fish, and other tasks.Today, the term "utility knife"...
.
The miners were able to survive by drinking groundwater
Groundwater
Groundwater is water located beneath the ground surface in soil pore spaces and in the fractures of rock formations. A unit of rock or an unconsolidated deposit is called an aquifer when it can yield a usable quantity of water. The depth at which soil pore spaces or fractures and voids in rock...
, seeping through the rock overhead, which they had collected in their helmets. Webb also had a muesli
Muesli
Muesli is a popular breakfast cereal based on uncooked rolled oats, fruit and nuts. It was developed around 1900 by Swiss physician Maximilian Bircher-Benner for patients in his hospital...
bar with him, which he offered to cut in half and share with Russell. The men initially agreed to wait 24 hours to eat it, but they continually extended the time, until they decided to eat it on 29 April. They then ate small pieces of the bar at a time, to make it last as long as possible. However, Russell later lost a large portion of his half of the bar when it fell out of his pocket.
Rescue effort
On 26 April a remote-controlled earth mover began clearing the rock underground. On the morning of 27 April at 7:22 a.m., the body of one of the miners was found in the shaft. At around 8 p.m., the body was retrieved and was identified as the body of Larry Paul Knight, 44, of LauncestonLaunceston, Tasmania
Launceston is a city in the north of the state of Tasmania, Australia at the junction of the North Esk and South Esk rivers where they become the Tamar River. Launceston is the second largest city in Tasmania after the state capital Hobart...
. He was the driver of the telehandler.
Rescue workers did not proceed further through the rubble past the back end of the telehandler because it was unsafe, instead choosing to blast a new tunnel across from the main decline to the side tunnel, aiming to come out in front of the telehandler. On 29 April they began blasting a new tunnel, detonating at least six large explosive charges to form the tunnel. The blasts dislodged rock inside the cage of the telehandler, which Webb and Russell attempted to clear, although as the blasts came closer, rock was dislodged faster than they could clear it. Russell recorded the date and time of each blast on his clothing, so that if they died as a result of the blasting, the rescuers would know that they had been alive prior to a particular blast. Both Webb and Russell also wrote letters to their families on their clothing. The two men sang "The Gambler
The Gambler (song)
"The Gambler" is the title of a song written by Don Schlitz and recorded by American country music artist Kenny Rogers. It was released in November 1978 as the title track from his album The Gambler which won him the Grammy award for best male country vocal performance in 1980. Bobby Bare had...
" by Kenny Rogers
Kenny Rogers
Kenneth Donald "Kenny" Rogers is an American singer-songwriter, photographer, record producer, actor, and entrepreneur...
(the only song they both knew) in order to keep up their spirits, as they waited for successive blasts to occur in the tunnel. At about 5.45PM on 30 April two rescuers, Pat Ball the Underground Manager and Steve Saltmarsh, Mine Foreman, breached safety protocols by entering the 925 level, to the rockfall and yelled out. Todd and Brant began yelling "We're in here!" and this was how the rescuers found out they were alive.
Later one rescuer found a direct route to the trapped miners, across the rubble in the side tunnel, and was able to get close enough to the basket of the telehandler to shake Russell's hand. This was where a remote-controlled loader had got to the back of the teleloader, but this route was deemed unsafe for rescuing them. Webb and Russell themselves did not want the rescuers to attempt to reach them through the rubble, because to do so would require them to cut through the wire on the side of the cage, which was under considerable pressure from the rock above. The two men were afraid that cutting the cage would cause it to collapse.
Rescuers immediately halted blasting in the access tunnel, and instead drilled a smaller hole through the approximately 14.5 metres of rock between the head of the access tunnel and the part of the side tunnel where the miners were trapped. Webb and Russell directed the work by listening to the sound of the drilling and judging the direction. The hole was about 90 millimetres in diameter. A PVC
Polyvinyl chloride
Polyvinyl chloride, commonly abbreviated PVC, is a thermoplastic polymer. It is a vinyl polymer constructed of repeating vinyl groups having one hydrogen replaced by chloride. Polyvinyl chloride is the third most widely produced plastic, after polyethylene and polypropylene. PVC is widely used in...
pipe was used to line the hole, which was used to deliver fresh water, food and communications equipment to the men.
On 1 May 2006 rescuers were still 12 metres from the miners. They were also later sent a digital camera
Digital camera
A digital camera is a camera that takes video or still photographs, or both, digitally by recording images via an electronic image sensor. It is the main device used in the field of digital photography...
, a torch
Flashlight
A flashlight is a hand-held electric-powered light source. Usually the light source is a small incandescent lightbulb or light-emitting diode...
, dry clothes, magazines, iPod
IPod
iPod is a line of portable media players created and marketed by Apple Inc. The product line-up currently consists of the hard drive-based iPod Classic, the touchscreen iPod Touch, the compact iPod Nano, and the ultra-compact iPod Shuffle...
s including music from the Foo Fighters
Foo Fighters
Foo Fighters is an American alternative rock band originally formed in 1994 by Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl as a one-man project following the dissolution of his previous band. The band got its name from the UFOs and various aerial phenomena that were reported by Allied aircraft pilots in World War...
and Kevin Bloody Wilson
Kevin Bloody Wilson
Kevin Bloody Wilson is a comedy singer/songwriter who uses his heavy Australian accent/style with great success...
(upon request), deodorant
Deodorant
Deodorants are substances applied to the body to affect body odor caused by bacterial growth and the smell associated with bacterial breakdown of perspiration in armpits, feet and other areas of the body. A subgroup of deodorants, antiperspirants, affect odor as well as prevent sweating by...
and toothpaste
Toothpaste
Toothpaste is a paste or gel dentifrice used with a toothbrush as an accessory to clean and maintain the aesthetics and health of teeth. Toothpaste is used to promote oral hygiene: it serves as an abrasive that aids in removing the dental plaque and food from the teeth, assists in suppressing...
. They also received letters from their families, and were able to write letters in return. In one letter to his wife, Russell wrote "It's not much of a room we have up here." Russell asked for the previous Saturday's newspaper because he said he would be looking for a new job, after joking about losing his current one for lazing about. One mine official questioned why Russell would want to look for a job, since he already had one. Russell, in a later interview, said that he had replied, "I told him to stick it up his ..." They were also sent medical supplies, with which Webb was able to treat the injuries to Russell's leg, with advice from paramedic
Paramedic
A paramedic is a healthcare professional that works in emergency medical situations. Paramedics provide advanced levels of care for medical emergencies and trauma. The majority of paramedics are based in the field in ambulances, emergency response vehicles, or in specialist mobile units such as...
s. It was also on 1 May that the two men also asked about Larry Knight, and rescuers told them that he had been found dead.
The rescue effort by drilling was put off on Monday 1 May because of the danger of another collapse. It was decided to use a raise borer
Raise borer
A raise borer is a machine used in underground mining, to excavate a circular hole between two levels of a mine without the use of explosives.The raise borer is set up on the upper level of the two levels to be connected, on an evenly laid platform...
anchored in concrete, with the last load of the concrete being delivered before dawn on Wednesday, 3 May 2006. The machine cut a horizontal tunnel one metre round. Later that day it was announced that the drilling to go the final 12 metres would commence within hours. At about 6:45 p.m., drilling of a 20 cm pilot hole for the raise borer
Raise borer
A raise borer is a machine used in underground mining, to excavate a circular hole between two levels of a mine without the use of explosives.The raise borer is set up on the upper level of the two levels to be connected, on an evenly laid platform...
commenced. Using the normal procedure for this machinery, a pilot hole was drilled, for the larger diameter borer to follow. This took more than three days to complete. According to Beaconsfield mine manager Matthew Gill, the quartz
Quartz
Quartz is the second-most-abundant mineral in the Earth's continental crust, after feldspar. It is made up of a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon–oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall formula SiO2. There are many different varieties of quartz,...
rock which was drilled through was 5 times harder than concrete. The drill was capable of drilling through it at 1 metre per hour, but it was going much more slowly because of the danger of further rock falls, at a rate of around 460 millimetres per hour.
Drilling of the rescue tunnel commenced on Thursday 4 May at about 8 p.m. guided by the completed pilot hole. It was gouged out to one metre and was planned to come up underneath the men's cage after passing through 16 metres of rock. The last phase was to involve a miner using hand tools to create an opening whilst lying on his back.
As at 7 a.m. on Saturday 6 May the raise borer had drilled about 11 metres of the 14.5 metre rescue tunnel. The mine decided on the shortened route late on Friday night. The major drilling operation was completed by 6 p.m. on Saturday, with only a few metres remaining to reach the trapped miners. Several hours work dismantling and removing the boring machine from the escape tunnel were required before the final phase of the rescue commenced.
On 7 May the rescuers reached a belt of hard rock that they found hard to penetrate. As the jack hammers they were using had little effect, they reverted to using low-impact charges. On 8 May the horizontal tunnel was completed, with rescuers beginning tunnelling upwards in the short vertical tunnel, since the horizontal tunnel had been dug lower than the level of the miners. At about 9:30 p.m. a probe passed through the rock below where the miners were located, which indicated there was only a metre between them, including 400 millimetres of hard rock.
After 14 nights, at 4:27 a.m., rescuers Glenn Burns, Donovan Lightfoot and Royce Gill finally reached the men, one of them yelling "I can see your light" when he broke through the ground which was separating him from the miners, to which the miners replied "I can see your light too". Brant Webb was freed at 4:47 a.m. on 9 May, followed by Todd Russell at 4:54 a.m. They were driven up the spiral decline of the mine, arriving at a medical station at the base of the vertical shaft from the surface at about 5:30 a.m. They were checked by a doctor, and then sent up the lift towards the surface. About thirty metres from the surface, they got out of their wheelchair
Wheelchair
A wheelchair is a chair with wheels, designed to be a replacement for walking. The device comes in variations where it is propelled by motors or by the seated occupant turning the rear wheels by hand. Often there are handles behind the seat for someone else to do the pushing...
s, which were moved to the rear of the lift so as to be out of sight. At 5:58 a.m. both men walked out of the lift cage unaided "... punching their fists in the air to the cheers of the Beaconsfield crowds who had gathered outside the mine gate.
Wearing their fluoro jackets and lit miner's helmets, the men switched their safety tags to 'safe' on the mine out board before embracing family members who rushed to hug them." Both were then transported to Launceston General Hospital
Launceston General Hospital
The Launceston General Hospital is one of the three main public hospitals in Tasmania, Australia. It is located in Launceston and serves the north of the state...
in nearby Launceston
Launceston, Tasmania
Launceston is a city in the north of the state of Tasmania, Australia at the junction of the North Esk and South Esk rivers where they become the Tamar River. Launceston is the second largest city in Tasmania after the state capital Hobart...
just after 6 a.m. local time. Russell had an injured knee, and a damaged vertebra which put pressure on his sciatic nerve
Sciatic nerve
The sciatic nerve is a large nerve fiber in humans and other animals. It begins in the lower back and runs through the buttock and down the lower limb...
, while Webb had injuries to both knees, several vertebra and his neck.
Reaction
Hundreds of journalists arrived in the town to cover the story, transforming Beaconsfield into a busy town. Some comedians joked at the time that the reason why the rescue took so long was because cables and wires being used by broadcasters at the site were blocking the path.Australian Opposition Leader Kim Beazley
Kim Beazley
In the October 1998 election, Labor polled a majority of the two-party vote and received the largest swing to a first-term opposition since 1934. However, due to the uneven nature of the swing, Labor came up eight seats short of making Beazley Prime Minister....
, at a May Day
May Day
May Day on May 1 is an ancient northern hemisphere spring festival and usually a public holiday; it is also a traditional spring holiday in many cultures....
march in Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
, associated the mining accident with the government's new industrial relations legislation
WorkChoices
The Workplace Relations Act 1996, as amended by the Workplace Relations Amendment Act 2005, popularly known as Work Choices, was a Legislative Act of the Australian Parliament that came into effect in March 2006 which involved many controversial amendments to the Workplace Relations Act 1996, the...
, after which Kevin Andrews
Kevin Andrews (Australian politician)
Kevin James Andrews is an Australian politician and member of the Liberal Party of Australia. He is a member of the House of Representatives and was Minister for Immigration and Citizenship in the Howard Government, having previously been Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations from 7...
called on him to apologise for politicising the incident. The then Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard
John Howard
John Winston Howard AC, SSI, was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He was the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister after Sir Robert Menzies....
said his message to the miners would be "Everybody is with you, mate".
On the afternoon of 7 May prominent Australian journalist Richard Carleton
Richard Carleton
Richard George Carleton was a multi-Logie Award winning Australian television journalist.-Education:Carleton was born in Bowral, New South Wales...
suffered a heart attack
Myocardial infarction
Myocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, results from the interruption of blood supply to a part of the heart, causing heart cells to die...
at a press conference while at the mine. He was transported to hospital, before being pronounced dead by a doctor.
Less than six hours after they were rescued, Todd Russell joined more than a thousand mourners at Larry Knight's funeral
Funeral
A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor...
. The funeral had been postponed constantly in the hope that both rescued miners could attend, before finally settling on Tuesday 9 May at 1 p.m. Russell attended after being discharged from Launceston General Hospital
Launceston General Hospital
The Launceston General Hospital is one of the three main public hospitals in Tasmania, Australia. It is located in Launceston and serves the north of the state...
in time.
When Dave Grohl
Dave Grohl
David Eric "Dave" Grohl is an American rock musician, multi-instrumentalist, and singer-songwriter who is the lead vocalist, guitarist, and primary songwriter for Foo Fighters; the former drummer for Nirvana and Scream; and the current drummer for Them Crooked Vultures...
of the Foo Fighters
Foo Fighters
Foo Fighters is an American alternative rock band originally formed in 1994 by Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl as a one-man project following the dissolution of his previous band. The band got its name from the UFOs and various aerial phenomena that were reported by Allied aircraft pilots in World War...
heard of the miners' request to have the band's music sent down on MP3 players, he issued a personal message via fax to them indicating he would meet them for a beer.
Grohl's note read, in part, "Though I'm halfway around the world right now, my heart is with you both, and I want you to know that when you come home, there's two tickets to any Foos show, anywhere, and two cold beers waiting for yous. Deal?" In October 2006, one of the miners took up his offer, joining Grohl for a drink after the Foo Fighters acoustic concert at the Sydney Opera House. Since then, Foo Fighters have written an instrumental tribute song called "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners" appearing on the album Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
The album debuted at the top of the UK album chart, selling 135,685 albums in its first week. The album also went platinum in its first week in both Australia and New Zealand. In the U.S., it entered the Billboard 200 album chart at #3, selling 168,000 copies in its first week, and has since been...
.
Following a meeting the Australian Workers' Union
Australian Workers' Union
The Australian Workers' Union is one of Australia's largest and oldest trade unions. It traces its origins to unions founded in the pastoral and mining industries in the 1880s, and currently has approximately 135,000 members...
held with the miners from Beaconsfield on 15 May they reported that no miner could be found who had been given workplace safety training, miners were unhappy with reductions in the amount of cement used to close in exploited parts of the mine, supports had been removed from lower parts of the mine and mesh intended to prevent rock collapse was known to be ineffective.
Media interest
Interest in gaining media dealsChequebook journalism
Chequebook journalism is the form of journalism where the essential characteristic is that the journalist pays the subject of the work money for the right to publish his story....
with both survivors culminated with Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey is an American media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer and philanthropist. Winfrey is best known for her self-titled, multi-award-winning talk show, which has become the highest-rated program of its kind in history and was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2011...
's production company Harpo
Harpo Productions
Harpo Productions, Inc. is an incorporated US-based multimedia production company founded by Oprah Winfrey . It also includes Harpo Films & Harpo Radio, Inc....
expressing interest. Interest from the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
was particularly strong given two January 2006 mining disasters in West Virginia
West Virginia
West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian and Southeastern regions of the United States, bordered by Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Ohio to the northwest, Pennsylvania to the northeast and Maryland to the east...
(see: Sago Mine disaster
Sago Mine disaster
The Sago Mine disaster was a coal mine explosion on January 2, 2006, in the Sago Mine in Sago, in Upshur County, West Virginia, USA, near the county seat of Buckhannon. The blast and collapse trapped 13 miners for nearly two days; one miner survived...
and Aracoma Alma Mine accident
Aracoma Alma Mine accident
The Aracoma Alma Mine accident occurred when a conveyor belt in the Aracoma Alma Mine No. 1 at Melville in Logan County, West Virginia caught fire...
) which resulted in the deaths of 15 miners.
Ten News
Ten News
Ten News is the national news service of Network Ten in Australia. The majority of its news bulletins are presented from the TEN-10 studios in Pyrmont...
reported that the survivors were offered $3 million each, and Channel Nine
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
boss Eddie McGuire
Eddie McGuire
Edward Joseph "Eddie" McGuire AM is an Australian television presenter and businessman known for his long association with Australian rules football and the Channel 9 television network....
attended the pub where the residents of Beaconsfield were celebrating the rescue. During The Footy Show
The AFL Footy Show
The Footy Show is a Logie Award winning Australian sports television program, shown on the Nine Network and its affiliates.This show, which is dedicated to the AFL and Australian rules football, made its debut on 24 March 1994 at the same time as the other version which relates to the NRL and rugby...
, they crossed live to a special event held in Beaconsfield where both miners appeared and were questioned by McGuire. The Daily Telegraph revealed that the Nine Network secured a deal for $2.6 million, for a 2-hour special on the night of Sunday 21 May entitled "The Great Escape". News reports said the miners told Kim Beazley
Kim Beazley
In the October 1998 election, Labor polled a majority of the two-party vote and received the largest swing to a first-term opposition since 1934. However, due to the uneven nature of the swing, Labor came up eight seats short of making Beazley Prime Minister....
(who visited them) some details about their ordeal, but they were kept "private", disguising the real reason behind the secrecy.
The story was extended by the continued stream of media reports detailing the ordeal, such as Enough Rope
Enough Rope
Enough Rope with Andrew Denton is a television interview show originally broadcast on ABC Television in Australia...
with Andrew Denton
Andrew Denton
Andrew Christopher Denton is an Australian television producer, comedian, Gold Logie-nominated television presenter and former radio host, and was the host of the ABC's weekly television interview program Enough Rope. He is known for his comedy and interviewing technique...
s interview with one of the rescuers, Paul Featherstone. Together with an Adelaide band, Unitopia, they have recorded a single
Single (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
, 321 Hours, with their wives.
Controversial Satirist and comic performer Dan Ilic
Dan Ilic
Dan Ilic is an Australian presenter, comedian and filmmaker. Ilic has been known for his parody work, including videos and Beaconsfield: The Musical, which he authored, and more recently for his work on the show Hungry Beast....
wrote and performed a show at the Melbourne Fringe Festival based on the disaster and the media's reaction to it, titled Beaconsfield: The Musical. The piece was originally titled Beaconsfield: A Musical in A-Flat Minor, but Ilic changed the controversial title 'out of respect'. The new title of the show is "Beaconsfield: A musical in no particular key" in reference to the media uproar over the initial name.
Further reading
- Ludeke, M. (2006) Ten Events Shaping Tasmania's History. Hobart: Ludeke Publishing.