best kind of follow up; All 39 miners now out of Totten Mine in Sudbury.
Thirty-nine miners who had been trapped underground in northern Ontario have now all safely made it to the surface. Vale, the company that owns the Totten Mine near Sudbury, Ont., says the rescue operation is now complete.
Thirty-nine miners who had been trapped underground in northern Ontario have now all safely made it to the surface.
Vale, the company that owns the Totten Mine near Sudbury, Ont., says the rescue operation is now complete.
The workers became trapped in the mine on Sunday when a scoop bucket being sent underground detached and blocked the mine shaft.
They had to scale a series of ladders to climb out of the mine and were helped along by a rescue crew.
The rescue operation began on Monday night.
Vale said the workers stayed in underground "refuge stations" and had access to food, water and medicine before climbing out.
Shawn Rideout, the chief mine rescue officer with Ontario Mine Rescue (OMR) who co-ordinated the efforts to bring the workers to the surface, said Wednesday everyone at the site was "pretty excited" to have all the miners out.
"It was very emotional to have the 39 guys return to the surface," Rideout told CBC News Network shortly after the last miner was brought out, noting that the spouses of the last four workers met them at the mine site.
"It was a lot of cheering, a lot of happy folks."
All 39 miners were able to climb out on their own.
Rideout said all the mine rescue workers were there, along with Vale management, representatives from the United Steelworkers union and families of the remaining workers.
Final worker came to surface 4:45 a.m. Wednesday
The last worker was brought to the surface around 4:45 a.m. Wednesday.
Rideout said there weren't any additional complications with the final four workers to be rescued.
"Just the added time of being underground," he said, noting that people were starting to cramp up from the dampness and lack of movement.
"So we had to take it extra slow, as we were getting the last four gentlemen."
Rescue workers didn't want to push anyone beyond their capabilities, Rideout said.
It was a very successful outcome.- Shawn Rideout, Ontario Mine Rescue
"And it was a very successful outcome."
Rideout said he expected everyone would be taking a couple of days to recover from the last three days.
"They were 72 intense hours," he said. "But yeah everyone is going to return back to normal, back to mining — without incident."