Chilean students reflect on mine rescue

Posted 10/28/10

Daniel Bascour-Zenteno and Violeta Vilches, both of Santiago, Chile, are two of four Chilean students studying at Northwest. Both have nearly completed bachelor's degrees at the Metropolitan University of Education in Santiago.

Bascour-Zenteno …

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Chilean students reflect on mine rescue

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Watching news coverage of the rescue of 33 miners in a copper mine in Chile earlier this month took on a personal meaning for a few Northwest College students. The miners were trapped after a cave-in at the San Jose Mine in northern Chile three months earlier.

Daniel Bascour-Zenteno and Violeta Vilches, both of Santiago, Chile, are two of four Chilean students studying at Northwest. Both have nearly completed bachelor's degrees at the Metropolitan University of Education in Santiago.

Bascour-Zenteno said he formerly worked in a mine office in Santiago, in the central part of the country, for the company that owned the San Jose Mine. As part of that employment, he sometimes visited the mine, he said.

Miners worked seven-day shifts, followed by seven days off, he said. During their work shifts, they lived inside the mine.

Because the mine shaft was so deep, it was more practical to do that than repeating the long process needed to go into and out of the mine each day, he said.

Vilches said other mines have housing units outside the mines for miners to live in, but miners still are separated from their families during on-duty weeks. Because the copper mines are in such remote areas, it isn't practical for them to go home at the end of each work day, she said.

Either way, “They are used to spending a long time down there (in the mines),” Bascour-Zenteno said.

Vilches said she learned much about mining by listening to her dad.

“Copper mining is the main business in Chile,” she said.

“It's called the salary of Chile,” added Bascour-Zenteno. “Copper mining is the biggest income.”

Miners are well paid because their work is hard and dangerous, Bascour-Zenteno and Vilches agreed.

“It has a lot of dangers,” Vilches said, “just like the accident (cave-in), or diseases like lung disease. It's really dangerous.”

Both said mine safety in Chile is not as good as it is in the United States.

“I don't think mine safety has improved as much in Chile,” Vilches said. “The main problem is inspection. Big enterprises may say they have all the right equipment, but they don't check.

“There are only two inspectors for the whole region,” which is the largest mine region in the country, she added. Mining companies may say they follow rules, “but the government doesn't check. They just believe them.”

But both also said that, even if mine safety were improved, the cave in still was likely to happen.

“I think it would have happened anyway,” Bascour-Zenteno said. “They knew the risks. Chile is a seismic country; the earth is not stable. Mines are also affected by that.”

Still, “there should be more safety procedures, but companies don't care about that,” he said.

Bascour-Zenteno and Vilches both keep in touch with their families over the Internet, and they got occasional updates on the progress of the plan to rescue the miners.

“Just one drill (provided by the United States) was millions of pesos,” said Vilches. “My mother told me, ‘Do you know how much it was from the drill?' It was a huge amount. It was really expensive.”

But, as time went on, family members complained that the mine rescue effort garnered too much of the media's attention.

“My family told me it was in the news every day,” Bascour-Zenteno said. “Other things were going on in Chile, but they were not covered by the media.”

“They were bored by all the media coverage,” Vilches agreed. “But they were all happy in the end when they got them all out. Everyone in the country was happy.”

She said many of her friends in Chile posted comments on their Facebook pages celebrating the miners' rescue. They usually read something like, “Oh, the miners! Thank God they're alive!” she said.

Bascour-Zenteno said the cave-in and three-month rescue effort likely will change the mine industry for the better.

“We always say there has to be something bad to change for the better,” he said. “The same is true of the earthquake.”

Vilches said she believes reconstruction after this year's earthquake will be better, making the country better prepared for the next one.

“A couple of bridges in my area collapsed,” she said. “They were rebuilding when I left, I hope with more safety.”

Bascour-Zenteno and Vilches both said their country pulled together during the months-long process to rescue the miners, and they continue to do so in the aftermath of the February earthquake.

“We Chileans help each other,” he said, regardless of feelings prior to an emergency.

Vilches agreed.

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