An equipment breakdown buried almost two dozen people underground in a Colorado tourist mine, killing at least one person and injuring others, Teller County sheriff’s authorities said Thursday.
The sheriff’s office said that all 23 people trapped in the Mollie Kathleen Mine on Thursday had been freed.
Officials say it’s unknown how the one person died. At an evening press conference, Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell described the fatality as a “tragic accident” caused by an elevator malfunction.
It will take a thorough inquiry to determine what happened, he said.
“Accidents happen when dealing with this kind of machinery,” Mikesell told me.
Earlier Thursday, an elevator problem was detected, prompting the rescue attempt, according to officials.
Initially, 11 individuals, including two children, were rescued, with the remaining 12 trapped in a shaft at the bottom of the mine. They had water and blankets and were communicating with emergency personnel, according to officials.
According to the sheriff’s office, some of the 11 people rescued complained of neck and back pain, while others were traumatized. Mikesell reported that none of the 12 personnel involved in the second round of rescue efforts were harmed.
The corpse of the deceased was discovered during the initial rescue, and officials are attempting to notify their family, according to Mikesell.
The final rescue from the 1,000-foot level of the mine occurred at 7 p.m. local time, Mikesell said, after the party of 12 — all adults from out of state — had been trapped in the mine for about six hours.
Mikesell said the 12 “came up very safely,” four at a time, and are all in “good spirits.”
Mikesell stated that the mine’s owner was “instrumental” in ensuring that the equipment could safely transport everyone back above ground.
According to Mikesell, the first group of passengers were caught in an elevator that had stopped halfway down the shaft. When it finally made up to the surface, engineers examined it to ensure there were no further problems.
Once cleared, they were able to lower and raise the elevator with no one inside, Mikesell added, and decided to utilize it to rescue the remaining passengers.
According to Mikesell, rescue crews simply informed the people that there was a problem with the elevator, and after being rescued, people expressed gratitude that they did not know more.
Sheriff’s officials originally stated that the mine did not collapse and that the incident was caused by an equipment fault.
According to officials, the mine hasn’t had an incident since 1986. Nobody perished in that incident, but passengers were trapped in the elevator as well, Mikesell added.
Teller County is located slightly over 100 miles south of Denver.
Gov. Jared Polis expressed “relief” that the 12 trapped people were successfully freed and his condolences to the friends and family of the one who died.
Polis also praised Mikesell and the rest of the rescue squad for their “swift response and tireless efforts.”
“Thanks to this collaborative effort, each of these individuals will return home safely,” Mr. Polis said.
Mikesell said Polis dispatched “as much needed personnel as we could get” to assist with the rescue effort, including inspectors to ensure the malfunctioning elevator was operational and mine safety crews. He went on to say that, together with first responders, “we were able to put together a plan that worked, and that plan was to bring them up through the elevator system.”
According to the mine’s website, it will close for the season on Sunday. According to Mikesell, the mine closed for the night on Thursday and intends to reopen next season.
It provides one-hour tours in which tourists can “vertically descend 100 stories into the earth” to “witness the evolution of overground mining,” according to the website.
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