Are we all gonna be script writers for the movie ?
Like caged rats
John Ferguson
22may06
TRAPPED like caged rats, the Beaconsfield miners planned to amputate their legs if caught in another life-threatening rock fall.
- They would have died from loss of blood FFS.
lmao@ hanging out for twoo weeks with no legs between you.
Brant Webb and Todd Russell told for the first time last night of their extraordinary battle to survive after being buried alive for 14 nights.
The pair revealed they were both hopelessly trapped under rock on the fateful Anzac evening when their colleague, Larry Knight, was entombed almost 1km underground.
Mr Russell, 35, was near death, almost completely buried. Mr Webb was buried up to his armpits.
Mr Russell had called for Mr Knight's help, not knowing he had been crushed by the fall.
"At that stage I yelled for Larry to get us out several times. Three or four times I was screaming, screaming for Larry to get us out," he told Channel 9.
Mr Webb, 37, had been knocked out briefly by the fall, Mr Russell said.
Mr Webb, near tears during the interview, said the ordeal had been emotionally taxing.
"I just thought, oh, I was just going off my head. I just thought I was a caged rat; you know, get me out of here . . ."
As part of detailed contingency plans while waiting to be saved, the pair talked about cutting legs off to save themselves, and how to apply tourniquets, if their legs were pinned again.
Mr Russell said: "We'd actually discussed that if we had to come to that conclusion -- our leg had to come off because it was pinned and it was going to be a risk for us -- we were prepared to take our leg off with a Stanley knife."
Mr Webb and Mr Russell reportedly received more than $2.5 million from the Packer empire for the interview, conducted over several hours last week.
The pair were trapped in an Anzac evening rock fall at Beaconsfield, about 40km north-west of Launceston.
The survivors were saved by a cage they were working in. It measured about 2m wide and 1.2m deep; the walls were about 1.5m high, but part of the cage was crushed by rock.
It was filled with rock and rubble on the night of the fall.
The blast from the seismic action had blown Mr Russell into the fetal position.
They revealed in last night's two-hour program that they had had virtually nothing in common, other than being miners from the same area.
As reported in the Herald Sun, Mr Russell came perilously close to dying on the night of the disaster.
It took five or six days for Mr Russell to get feeling back into his left leg, which had been pinned under rock during the initial rock fall.
The legs of both were pinned. Mr Webb said: "I knew he was in trouble when he stopped shouting for my name."
Mr Russell said: "And the pressure was getting that bad around the chest and cavity area that it was starting to push fluids up, and I was vomiting fluids up."
He said he had willed himself to live. "I could just see the picture of my wife and the three children and . . . I said to myself 'I'm not dying here'," he said.
"I said 'No'; said 'I'm not dying here."'
Once they were found, five days after the rock fall, the pair faced an exasperating wait as a new tunnel was drilled through dense rock.
They would spend a total of 14 nights underground before being released in the early hours of May 9.
Mr Webb said that despite having little in common, he had relied on Mr Russell, particularly as blasting to free them began.
Mr Russell said: "I basically came up with a little saying that I said to Brant. I said 'Look, mate, if you don't settle down I'm going to have to give you a kiss."'
Both men were overwhelmed by the efforts of the rescuers.
Mr Webb said: "They didn't lie to us. They kept us in the loop to keep our spirits up, you know."
