Have they found the trapped miners yet?

[Janell]

I see all kinds of stories about the situation but I haven't been able to find an article to see if they can hear them or if they are alive etc.

[Way3]

All I could find was this:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070808/..._mine_collapse
that said:
"Murray said earlier the bore holes they should bring information about the status of the miners in the next few days. If the miners are alive, he said, they could survive on available air "for perhaps weeks.""

[Casa Nova]

I heard on cnn that it will take up to a week to get to them.

[Janell]

Originally Posted by Casa Nova

I heard on cnn that it will take up to a week to get to them.

I heard there is plenty of air and water how are they so sure they have access to those sources....

[Janell]

This just in:
Drill rigs perched on a steep mountain cut through sandstone Thursday to within a few hundred feet of where six coal miners caught in a collapse 1,500 feet underground are believed to be, one of the mine's co-owners said.

The 2 1/2-inch-diameter hole reached a depth of 1,300 feet, leaving just 200 feet to go before rescuers could finally learn if the miners survived the cave-in early Monday. The hole was expected to be finished later Thursday.

A wider hole, slightly less than 9 inches wide, was also being drilled and officials hoped it could break through by Friday, said Bob Murray, chairman of mine co-owner Murray Energy Corp.

"We will put cameras down. We will provide communication. We will provide food. We could keep them alive indefinitely," Murray said.

The smaller hole would allow a communications line to be lowered to the entombed miners, while the larger shaft would permit food and water to be lowered into the depths.

The drilling crews made significant progress overnight. Efforts to clear rubble blocking a tunnel to the miners also made steady progress, Murray said in a pre-dawn update.

The miners were believed to be about 3 1/2 miles from the entrance to the Crandall Canyon mine 140 miles south of Salt Lake City.

"With a little help from God and a little luck, they'll get out," said mine safety manager Bodee Allred.

The miners' families have been receiving private briefings on the rescue effort from Murray, who said he took two relatives of the trapped miners underground Wednesday to show them the rescue efforts.

Murray's company has 19 mines in five states, facilities that vary widely in the number of fines, citations and injuries, according to an Associated Press review of federal Mine Safety and Health Administration records.

At Crandall Canyon mine, the safety record was remarkably good, said R. Larry Grayson, a professor of mining engineering at Penn State University.

In a narrow canyon surrounded by the Manti-La Sal National Forest, two parallel shafts lead deep into the mine, linked by smaller tunnels about every 130 feet. The walls of both passageways appeared to have imploded, creating a debris pile of dirt, coal and splintered timbers that nearly fills the 8-foot by 14-foot mine shafts.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=3461951

[Slippery]

I really hope they're all ok.

[ScreaM]

Damn hope they all get out alright.

[zand_stein]

I hope them to be alright..........

[Janell]

tiny microphone lowered deep into the earth early Friday picked up no evidence that six coal miners are alive four days after they were caught in a cave-in. But an air sample indicated enough oxygen to breathe was present in the chamber where the miners are believed to be trapped, and rescuers promised to keep digging toward them.

Using a steel drill bit to bore a 2 1/2-inch wide hole more than 1,800 feet into the mountain site of Monday's cave-in, rescuers finally broke through late Thursday. Though a crude air sample indicated plenty of oxygen and no methane in the pocket, it also did not pick up carbon dioxide, the gas exhaled when people breathe.

[Janell]

Still no signs of life. It's not looking good.

[Janell]

With the drilling of another hole, the search for six missing miners moved Tuesday toward the back of a mine where officials hoped the men sought refuge in search of an air pocket.

Crews already have drilled two holes and fitted a camera down one of them, but they have yet to learn the coal miners' fate, eight days after the mine partly collapsed under the weight of a shifting mountain.

The camera's ghostly images revealed only one indication of a miner's presence: a tool bag for hammers, wrenches and chisels hanging from a post, 3.4 miles from the entrance and more than 1,800 feet underground.

"It indicates we're very close to where the miners were working," said Bob Murray, chief of Murray Energy Corp., co-owner and operator of the Crandall Canyon mine.