It was August 5, 2010 when part of the San Esteban Primera Mining Company mine collapsed in Chile’s Atacama Desert. The mine produced gold and copper.
33 workers who were 700 meters underground were trapped.
Searches were immediately launched to find out if there were any survivors. So sound signals began to be sent through holes made with drills. All of them were found to be alive without any injuries when the rescuers received a text message from the workers through a hole that was opened.
By August 23 the trapped men were eating little of their supplies and drinking water from dripping points.
Rescuers were then able to send supplies to the workers to survive.
Eventually the rescuers managed to open sufficiently large holes in the mountain and were able to pull all the workers to the ground on 13 October.
The entire rescue lasted 69 days and cost 20 million US dollars.
[Source: http://www.britannica.com]
