Wednesday, February 16, 2011

chilean miners contemplated cannibalism

It's been four months since 33 men were rescued from a collapsed Chilean mine - and many people out there would like to tell rescued Chilean miner Victor Zamora and others to keep their spirit up no matter how dark their days may get - there is light at the end of even this tunnel. The miner says he'd rather be dead after being rescued from a Chilean mine last year. Fellow rescued miner Alex Zega has to take six pills a day just to talk to people and a once outgoing Mario Sepulveda is now on heavy medication. In an interview with Bob Simon on "60 Minutes," the miners revealed that many of them are now suffering severe psychological problems. The gruesome truth about what it was like to be trapped half a mile underground for weeks is startling and tragic.
The miners, who would be trapped for several weeks, had an emergency food supply that barely kept all 33 men alive. The miners were reduced to eating a spoon of canned tuna every 48 hours. Zamora says they all thought about just ending their lives; "I said to a friend, 'Well, if we are going to continue suffering, it would be better for us to all go to the refuge, start an engine and with the carbon monoxide, just let ourselves go.'"
"It was to not continue suffering. We were going to die anyway," he tells Simon.
Miner Nathan Franklin revealed that cannibalism was even considered at one point: "I would say five or 10 days [before they would have resorted to cannibalism to survive]."