Copiapo Mining Disaster – Los Treinta Y Tres.

We are staying in Copiapo which is the nearest town to the Chilean mining accident and the rescue of 33 miners; known locally as simple Los Treinta y Tres. So a quick look at Wikipedia produced the Lat/Long coordinates of the site and the GPS then took us out to the mine – the San Jose Copper and Gold mine.

If this was anywhere else in the world, there would be an interpretive centre, a gift shop, and buses of tourists. Here there was an old watchman, nothing to mark the site, and a half-finished memorial. Apparently the actual rescue capsule is in front of the Parliament building in Santiago and nobody can agree where to put the backup capsule or how to memorialise the rescue.

The actual hole is capped (don’t want anyone falling back in there) but we at least managed to sit and get a photo at the site.

The sign that is left by the entrance says “Juntos haremos una faena segura” which means (I think) “Together we will make a safe workplace”. Well they DID get the miners out even if it did take 68 days. Luckily the guys weren’t mining in China.

Mining Accident – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Copiap%C3%B3_mining_accident