Quecreek miner shares story of survival as 20th anniversary approaches
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — Next week marks 20 years since the Quecreek Mine rescue.
On July 24, 2002, nine coal miners were trapped underground when the Somerset County mine where they were working flooded. The ordeal focused the world's attention on a small farm where the miners would eventually emerge alive nearly 80 hours later.
For John Unger, one of the nine men who was once trapped 240 feet underground, it's hard to believe it's been 20 years.
"It got cold, our body temperature. Whoever was the coldest, we laid on top of them to try to keep warm," Unger said. "We were totally soaked. There was nothing dry."
While Unger was soaked in a subterranean air pocket with his friends, a team of miners on the surface, equipment operators and engineers scrambled to find where the men were.
But somehow, mine safety expert and engineer Joseph Sbaffoni figured it out. The drilling began while the miners waited underground. They wrote notes to family members in case their one-time workplace became their grave.
"I told my family how I really felt about them," Unger said.
But somehow, they managed. Seventy-seven hours later, Unger came up in the rescue basket to a world that would never be the same, but in a good way.
"You come out and everybody is yelling and cheering and all you could see were lights," Unger said.
So much was learned about mine rescue and safety after Quecreek, but the people involved said they learned a lot about themselves and others.
"Americans are great people," said Bill Arnold, director of the Quecreek Mine rescue site. "And if we pull together, we can do great things."