Chapter 6

Val reached Lisa first and held her. The eighteen year old was shaking, deathly white but not crying.

"What is it darling?" she asked, drawing her robe on over her sleeping gown.

"Oh Lisa, what is it?" Irene arrived completely nude so Val let Lisa go to haul off her robe and wrap it around Irene.

Nash pushed in and taking Lisa in his arms growled, "Tell me baby, take your time."

Gary and Lance arrived, skidding to a halt on the polished wood kitchen floor where the others were grouped around the recessed phone bay just in time to hear Lisa intone, "There's been a collapse in Tunnel 3 at the mine."

Everyone relaxed knowing Lisa said earlier her father Jake was working day shift this week.

"Oh damn," Nash said. "What rotten luck. Guys, get dressed. Gary go to the workshop and grab ropes, picks, shovels and torches. Lance go with him and grab the two emergency lighting units in the side room and then unplug the trickle charger leads on both batteries and screw back the water caps before lifting the batteries. Go fast but don't rush to get those caps screwed back on tightly. Val and Irene, pack refreshments, water and throw in a bottle of whisky."

"My mother said Jake is one of three men trapped underground in that tunnel."

Everyone froze except Nash who dropped to his knees. "Why is Jake there darling? He is working day shift this week - I heard you say that twice."

"His pal Rick Mellows failed to turn up so daddy volunteered to do double shift."

"Oh Christ," Nash said, clutching Lisa. "Did Melissa say anything else?"

"Yes, she's off to the mine and it apparently was a roof collapse, a big one. But thankfully no explosion was detected."

"Thank God for that, there is some hope for them, every hope if they managed to keep clear of the rock fall and were not overcome by dust. Put warm clothing and come with us Lisa."

"Go you guys," Val ordered. "Take Gary's truck because it's the faster vehicle, Melissa and I will follow in the Jeep with provisions, blankets and folding chairs as there's bound to be a vigil."

The mine was a mile off the main highway, a little closer to the town than Pihama Peak Stations, but most of the emergency and other traffic was coming from the Plainsville end so with a virtually uncluttered road and driving at very high speed they were one of the first dozen vehicles to arrive from the outside.

The deputy mine manager recognized Nash but shook his head. The mine boss had given orders, no one but company personal and emergency services would to be permitted to go down the shaft. "It's been a big fall Nash and the dust on our side of it is about settled so the first two rescue teams have gone down, another two are ready to go."

He pointed out to Nash on a plan on the mine, illuminated by floodlights, the position of Tunnel 3. "We're lucky because that heads west where we've virtually had no trouble with water penetration or coal gas because on average is only ninety-five feet below the surface so if we have too much to shift to reach them we might find it faster to drill down to them once we discover where they are."

"Kevin, is there a larger plan than this one, giving more detail?"

"Yep Nash, over in the dining and recreation room where the women and relatives are waiting."

"Lance, wait here for our team, Lisa you come with Gary and me and stay with your mother."

"Why the interest in the larger layout?"

"Just something Kevin said. Damn, I should have asked how far in was the fall."

A newspaper journalist looking at the same plan said the brief official statement says almost thirty feet in. "The assistant manager told me it was unlikely the fall would be more than fifty feet long. Trouble is it's an older shaft so the modern-style excavators being used much lower down are too large for No. 3 and all the other extraction equipment will take ages to bring up and lay down the tracks so basically its air-drills and pick and shovel and motorized skips to cart debris away."

Nash looked for the scale of the drawing, made some finger spans on the wallboard and began smiling.  He crossed to another wall displaying smaller cross-sections and lost his smile."

"Damn."

"What's wrong boss?"

"Frustration. Kevin mentioned the air supply was good, so I immediately thought perhaps some of it would be natural air. On the big map I saw an airshaft approximately seventy feet in and thought problem solved but see here, there are three airshafts and two of them will be beyond the rock fall. But for some reason both shafts have a right angle at about fifty feet and then continue down to the roof of the tunnel. They are not very wide but I thought I was being brilliant and we could have lowered picks and handles separately, shovels, torches, foot and drink to anyone alive down there. They could have then started digging out towards their rescuers. But it's no good because of the right angle. Mine management would have already been aware of that. I still can't figure out why the right-angles."

Gary took a very close look at the profiles. "Look at this. See, very faint vertical lines. They must have drilled through crappy stuff and over the years there were collapses so they would have then had better technology allowing them to pick better spots to drill and then used new-age right-angle drilling techniques to go through more stable material to join to the original shafts and thereby save money by not having to continue down through solid rock. They could have somehow plugged the unstable shaft to stop debris falling. That's my theory."

"Or they sent a skinny guy down fifty feet to break through to the original shaft with a pneumatic hand drill but at a steep angle rather than right angles as shown here to facilitate airflow with minimal interference?" Nash suggested.

"Yeah, perhaps only a fifteen degree slope would do it. Are we going to take a look?"

"May as well. I'll tell Lisa we're off to look around as soon as I take a sketch. Pity we don't have a compass."

Gary said there was one fixed into the instrument panel of Lance's vehicle.

Lisa went with them because Melissa was fulltime comforting a pregnant woman and appeared to be braving it out okay.

They found Val and Irene waiting with Lance and seeing the two vehicles together gave Nash an idea. He took over the wheel of the Jeep and told Lance to follow him. The women were invited along. Once up on the plateau Nash lined the Jeep up forty yards to the north of the main entry to the mine, walked back twenty places and guided Lance to face due west and lined the Jeep up also facing west and left their headlights on to high beam.

Nash then gathered everyone around. "Somewhere out in front of us are three air vent shafts. They will be built up above the ground with a roof raised above the shaft extension to shed rainwater away from the opening. I want you guys to spread out in twos with a torch and walk very carefully as the terrain is rough. The first one should be within 100 feet beyond us."

"What's that?" Gary asked. To the right, down range in the lights of the Jeep."

"Wow, the search is virtually over before it's started," Nash said. "I reckon that's what we're looking for.  Come with me Gary, you others stay here until you see our torches flash and they drive down carefully in lowest gear to us."

Five minutes later, 200 feet from the first shaft they found the second shaft and flashed their torches.

By the time the vehicles had arrived Nash had shed his jacket and Akubra and pulled out the weather cover and tossed it away.

Lance came running with a short rope and tied it around Nash's chest and then made a noose in the rope about Nash's head for a handgrip and then made a nose at the other end of the rope to connect to the winch of the Jeep. Val then engaged the winch and Gary walked the hook on the wire cable and placed it through the end noose and snapped the spring-loaded safety hinge closed.

"You're wasting you time Nash," Lisa said. "You have cute narrow hips, very little ass, no gut to speak of but wide shoulders that won't fit."

"I'll think thin and slip through," Nash gritted.

Everyone looked back from Lisa to Nash and then at the fairly narrow shaft. Everyone frowned.

"I'll go down to the bend to figure out what to do. Gary, you stay at the mouth of the shaft and follow my instructions. You other guys stay silent so Gary can hear me."

Nash wriggled into the shaft to begin his descent and was halted at the point there the rope circled his chest. He became almost jammed.

"Oh fuck, this is hopeless. Get me out of here Gary."

It took the combined strength of Gary and Lance to pull Nash out.

After regaining his breath and slugging back some water, Nash asked, "What now?"

"I reckon I'm not quite as thick through the chest and am marginally narrower at shoulders than you boss but for some reason I weigh more."

"You pack more on the ass Gary," Nash grinned and everyone laughed and the frustration within the group eased somewhat.

"Let me try."

Val bellowed ‘No!' and watched Lisa step forward to Nash who was sitting on the metal extension of the shaft.

He eyed her, obviously thinking about her size compared with his.

"Nash, don't you dare," Val scowled as she moved up alongside Lisa without touching her. "The baby and she's no warrior."

Nash rubbed his chin and said thoughtfully, "Her tits stick out more than her tummy does right now."

"Nash!" Val said in fury and some of those behind her stepped back half a pace, their faces unreadable by Nash looking against the headlights of the vehicles but his face was set, as was his jaw.

Lance who was standing alongside Gary whispered, "We are watching the biggest showdown this district has ever witnessed."

"Shut your mouth Val - my father is down there. Alive I trust."

Val opened her mouth to unleash when Irene darted forward bravely and dug her fingers really hard into Val's arm. Val hunched in pain.

"Do you think you can do it lass?"

"Yes as you were not far from slipping into the shaft. But call me Lisa."

A wee smile flitted across Nash's face.

"I work with him almost every day, all day. He's gonna let her do it," Gary whispered to Lance.

"What's your plan Lisa?"

"One step at the time. First I go down for a recce."

"You mean reconnaissance?"

"Yes."

Nash said, "No one, not even Val can say that isn't smart. Get ready."

Lisa turned to look at Val who in a shaky voice said, "Keep safe darling. If it were my father I'd want to do the same thing."

Half and hour later, Lisa was lifted from the shaft, looking very white and shivering. She was covered in slime and dirt up to her shoulders and grazes were evident through rips to her shirt and on a couple of clear patches to her bare legs. But she suffered no rope burns because she'd worked out the cleanest way to be lowered was to stand in a foot loop with the rope coming up on one side of her body and passing through a tiny loop near her ear held in lighter rope tied to a loop in the rope above her head for her to hold to keep one arm above her head to handle anything lowered to her.

With two blankets around her and sipping warm coffee, Lisa confirmed she was fine and that she'd spent most of the time standing on rubble in thigh deep water with the angle shaft just below her face.

"They would have drilled the new shaft deeper into solid rock to take the tailings as the angled connecting shaft was being drilled," Garry said. "The guy who managed to drill those angle shafts must have been the skinniest guy in the district."

"Did you hear anything?" Val asked.

"Yes."

Gary, Lance and Irene pushed in to listen.

"Leo Stephens. He copped a rock on his shoulder."

There were gasps and Nash, who was sitting on the shaft with Lisa on his knee, held up his hand for silence.

"He said the collapse occurred progressively so the three of them ran away from it. They were engulfed in dust and he copped a bouncing rock on his shoulder. They don't believe it's broken bone. My father and Mike Withers are at the rubble face, clawing out debris at the top of the pile. They've found an iron bar to assist as a lever, but that's all. He then left to tell the other two that help is also coming from above them."

Nash hugged Lisa and asked, "If you go down again do you think you can slide gear through to them."

"Definitely."

"Can you go down again?"

"My father's down there Nash, the Mayor's youngest son and Mike's wife is due with her second child at the end of the month, according to what Leo told me. There's no way will I forsake them. Now listen, there's good air down there. I stood quietly and then discovered I could actually feel the airflow when I dropped my hair towards the angle cut. But one of you should go off and alert the person in charge of the rescue operation. But wait. Tell them to bring two phone lines with a phone for me and one to lower through to the guys in the tunnel. Bring a safety helmet for me and a canvas basket to lower stuff down to me to pass through to the trio. A forced air supply of course but they'll know what to bring. Oh, get them to hunt out the smallest wetsuit they have and then I'll be able to stay down there for hours if necessary. Providing I can talk to someone I'll be okay. So tell them to get priority to the phone lines and the wetsuit. Those guys down there know they are safe, that it's only a matter of waiting."

Val came in with a metal folding chair, sat on it and held her arms out to take Lisa from Nash.

"Nash, you go with Lance as you have considerable authority because of that stupid reputation of yours. Tell them we want no one up here apart from the rescue team and direct next-of-kin."

"What about the media?"

"What about them Nash?"

"The rescue team deserves kudos including our people and the mining company will want to be shown in a favorable light and let's not forget that mining is a valuable contributor to the economy of the town."

"Tell the coordinator to make the best decision on that. Off you go."