The Hindu deserves praise for giving prominence to the miners' rescue in Chile. The incident created a lot of interest throughout the world and rightly so. Many may remember the 1958 Chinakuri mine accident in West Bengal, in which 175 people died. Some miners survived for over a month. They were somehow brought out.
Utpal Dutt, renowned actor and playwright, wrote a play on the tragedy and staged it to packed houses at Kolkata for a long period. Tapas Sen who arranged the lights made the spectators feel they were inside the mine, struggling to save themselves from drowning. People dying in accidents is nothing unusual. But Chinakuri and, now, Chile, remind us of the glorious struggle of man against disasters.
Venuturupally Suryam,
Secunderabad
In 1972, a coal mine near the Sitarampur rescue station in West Bengal was drowned and 39 miners were trapped inside. Thanks to the availability of workings on the rise side (air pockets), the miners took shelter in the rise. The mine's exit was not approachable as the workings were flooded.
An old drill rig from a nearby mine was shifted to a place located to drill a six-inch hole to connect up workings. The same was completed in two to three days. Communication with the miners was established, and food and medicines were sent in. An IIT professor was entrusted with the job of designing a skip to work in a bigger hole to bring up the trapped miners. The work was executed and all 39 miners were brought out safely after 18 days. This was perhaps the earliest instance of establishing an access and bringing the miners to safety.
S.V. Krishna Murthy,
Palakkad
