by Gregg Olsen
“Jesus Christ,” someone muttered.
The stink was so overpowering that with the first unzipped cadaver, it became obvious that the gruesome task couldn’t continue at that funeral home. The stench would kill the mortician’s business. After that, bodies were dispatched to the Shoshone Inn Nursing Home in Kellogg. The not-yet-opened nursing home would serve as a temporary morgue, but a more discreet location would be needed.
An examiner wrote: “We knew most of these men for many years, yet some unexplained mechanism seemed to dull over our emotions and we were able to function almost normally.”
MORNING, MAY 6
Shifter’s Shack
A TWO-WAY RADIO CRACKLED UNDERGROUND, AND THE REPORTER with the Red Cross armband, Jerry McGinn, overheard descriptions of tragic tableaux discovered by the helmet crew: a fallen father with his arm wrapped around his son’s shoulder; a man holding a sandwich, frozen in the moment. From each pocket of the dead, a story emerged of men trying to get out, or dying before they knew what hit them. McGinn also heard the names of the dead. One was the husband of a woman he’d been talking with while delivering blankets and coffee. After that, whenever she asked him if he knew something, he said they were still sifting through the mine. He didn’t give her any hope. He avoided a direct answer.
As McGinn hunkered in the shifter’s shack Saturday morning, word circulated in the yard that there was a reporter hiding out as a rescue worker or Red Cross volunteer. The man was using a disguise to infiltrate the inner circle of the rescue effort and to cozy up to families waiting at the portal.
They’re talking about me, McGinn thought, his pockets full of toilet tissue scrawled with notes. He wished himself invisible. No one in the shack said a word to him.
Correspondents from other media outlets had wised up. They started asking about the UPI reporter who kept pushing a higher body count. The Wallace Miner published an article about the unidentified undercover reporter, and someone from the AP pinned the tearsheet on a wall where the press congregated. On the top of the paper, someone had scrawled, “We want to meet this fella.”
Topside, as the temperature dropped, the waiting families were weary, damp, and cold. Some of the Army reservists pitched a huge tent to shield people from a pinprick rain that stopped and started in a rolling rhythm. That day, the waiting families found some comfort in their government representatives. Idaho senator Frank Church once more urged Nixon to ease the district’s burden with financial assistance. With Sunshine shut down, unemployment rolls were expected to double in Shoshone County. The Steelworkers demanded a congressional probe. None of its members trusted the USBM or the Department of the Interior to do the job without trying to cover their own asses.
In addition to the USBM’s high-sensitivity geophone listening system—a microphone and walkie-talkies—a crew prepared to lower a video camera into the borehole. The camera was state of the art, similar to what had been used to record the famous images of the Apollo spacecraft on the moon in July 1969. The camera was an eye that could see in the dark. The reconnaissance of the borehole to 4800 was important to determine whether or not it could accommodate one of the AEC capsules. It was slow going down the 1,100-foot drop.
It was a common misconception that a shaft or a borehole was a perfectly constructed rock tube. It was straight to the extent that the passageway was vertical, but there were bumps and bulges, and nicks of a size sufficient to hold a truck camper. The crew needed to “bar down” part of the passage. Hammers and heavy steel rods splintered off any fractured and loose rock, letting it fall to the bottom, rather than onto the cage or a man’s head. By the end of the day, the capsule had only reached 4400. Provided the anomalies associated with the rough stone channel were not insurmountable—the clearance for the capsule was about five inches on each side—a two-man team would ride the capsule to 4800 and work its way back to 10-Shaft, looking for survivors. The video feed was viewed on a monitor on 3700.
The two capsules from Nevada, courtesy of an AEC subcontractor, Reynolds Electric and Engineering Company, were scheduled to be in Spokane by 8:00 a.m. the next day.
Crews tackled the smoke from the top of the Jewell, removing two sections of the three-piece ventilation stack so a 240-horsepower Buffalo Forge fan could be mounted there to draw out carbon monoxide and smoke from the mine’s interior.
Air leaks and excessive heat at 3100 station once again delayed complete recovery and use of the hoist room. Operating any equipment in the heat was dubious; a fan was ordered down to 3100. It would take another twelve hours to get it to the point where the hoist could be used. Curiously, the men in the command center had let go of some of the frustration and tension that had colored every moment. It wasn’t that they were giving up, but more that they had become accustomed to a rescue effort that met obstacles at every turn. The hard way, it seemed, became the only way. The bureau tried to procure more breathing units, but neither manufacturer of the government-sanctioned breathing units—McCaa nor Draeger—had any surplus. All other mines that had any spares had already sent them. The bureau turned to a London manufacturer of mine-safety equipment. Instead of the high-pressure oxygen cylinder of the Draeger and McCaa, the Aerlox employed an evaporator filled with liquid oxygen. They were also lighter and cooler. An Aerlox face mask supplied oxygen at 65 degrees Fahrenheit—the others could get as hot as 120 degrees. For the beleaguered helmet crew toiling in the depths of hell, it was as though they’d been breathing through a hair dryer. Within a couple of hours of the request, thirty-five British Aerlox units were packed on an Air Force jet headed for Spokane.
AFTERNOON, MAY 6
Osburn
ACROSS THE DISTRICT IN OSBURN, THE SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST church, with its high-peaked A-frame façade, had never seen a funeral like Don Beehner’s. So many people came that the blue upholstered pews could only accommodate half the mourners. A loudspeaker piped the service to the overflow crowd outside. A fragrant spray of roses and feathery ferns was mounted on a tripod facing the mourners. A pink satin ribbon was pinned across the arrangement with the words To Daddy written in glittery cursive script. Wava and her children sat in the front row, her youngest daughter, Nora, in a pretty red dress her mother had borrowed. The pastor told the mourners how Beehner had taken his kids hunting with only a single bullet because he never wanted to kill anything. He had been a gentle guy, one who had worked hard to provide for his wife and children. Don Beehner, a man who grew up with a boozing father and without two nickels to rub together, had done all right with the thirty-eight years God had given him. The service lasted twenty minutes. Don had always said not to make a fuss, and a good funeral was a short one.
After Don Beehner was laid to rest at Nine Mile Cemetery, the little green house on Burke Road was jammed with more people than on any single day in the dozen years the family had lived there. Matthew Beehner counted nineteen cars parked outside. He stood in the kitchen watching various family members embrace each other, balance teetering plates of food on their knees, or just mill around. He looked up at their faces, all red and tear-stained. It seemed like a sad little party.
TIME UNKNOWN, MAY 6
4800 Level
THE SURVIVORS IN THE SAFETY ZONE HAD WAITED FOR HELP FOR more than four days, more than one hundred hours, and with each hour the idea that they might not ever get out became more vivid, more frequent in their discussions. It was startling how quickly and completely the implausible had become possible. They knew that eventually the rescue team would find them. They were, after all, on a level that was prime silver country.
“They aren’t going to seal off the mine and forget about us,” Wilkinson said.
“Yeah, but what’s going to happen to us?”
Flory slumped on his bedboard, looking small and defeated.
“Are they gonna get to us before we starve to death?”
Wilkinson saw Flory sinking into depression.
“We’re gonna get out of this,” he said.
To
put the focus on anything other than their situation, Flory taught Wilkinson how to square-braid yellow blasting wire, and for hours in the shadows they said nothing as they spun out chains of yellow. At one point Flory made a checkerboard of lagging, and the two men played checkers until they could no longer stand it. And they talked about fishing trips they’d taken and ones they would take if and when they got out. Wilkinson said that the guys on the surface were just biding their time playing pinochle and waiting for the smoke to clear out of the mine.
“And our wives are planning on how they’re going to spend the insurance money,” he said.
Yet, even as they labored for distraction in the Safety Zone, neither man could ignore hunger gnawing with sharp little teeth at their stomachs. The rotten tuna sandwich had offered no relief. They had tried to trick their stomachs into a false fullness with gulps from the water line. And it had worked for a while; the first four days hadn’t been completely unbearable. But by Saturday their stomachs had wised up and would no longer fall for the ruse. Hunger stabbed at them. How much longer could they go without food?
LATE EVENING, MAY 6
Sunshine Portal
THE KELLOGG EVENING NEWS STAFF DISTRIBUTED FREE COPIES AT THE mine on Saturday. Papers fluttered in the chilly night air, the front page screaming, SUNSHINE MINE DEATH TOLL NOW RISES TO 40. Near a Red Cross tent where they waited, Garnita Keene began to wonder if Myrna had deluded herself to such a degree that if Ron had died, she’d be unable to process it at all. And even after she allowed those thoughts to take root, the words never passed her lips. She couldn’t be the one to say them to Myrna. She had been the one to help her kid sister with a slathering of Day-Glo orange Mercurochrome on skinned knees. Garnita had been there when Myrna needed help with her son, Tiger. Myrna had been through a lot in her life and was a young mother, but she still was a kid. She needed hope, not a dose of reality.
“He’ll come out,” Garnita said, concealing her doubts.
Myrna’s confidence remained steadfast.
“I know,” she said.
The sisters tangled their arms around each other and stayed back from the portal as others learned the bodies of their men had been located. Garnita caught herself with a lump in her throat, over and over, when names were made public.
“I never thought he’d die. I thought for sure that he’d make it out.”
Myrna held her ground. “Ron is going to make it.”
Garnita saw the faces of women who had told themselves the same thing, but who now knew otherwise.
She put her hand on Myrna’s shoulder. She felt so thin, so tiny. How much longer can she go on? Garnita thought.
“If anyone comes out, it will be Ron,” she said.
Later that night, Myrna’s heart was tested again when a friend came running to her.
“I saw Ron in town! He must have got out!”
“What do you mean, you saw Ron?”
The friend’s excitement could barely be contained. “In town. In his truck.”
“No,” Myrna said. “Ron can’t be driving around Kellogg. He’s in the mine. I’d know if he’d got out. I’ve never left this spot.”
Myrna learned later that one of her brothers-in-law had taken the keys out of her husband’s hanger in the dry. It seemed as if the Florys were acting as though Ron was dead.
Fuck them for that. Damn all of those Florys, she thought bitterly.
NIGHTFALL, MAY 6
Big Creek Neighborhood
THE BIG CREEK NEIGHBORHOOD WAS QUIET AS THE HOURS MELTED into Sunday morning. Marvin Chase came home late, huddled with his wife and children, and tried to sleep. Bob Launhardt called his wife, Janet, in Seattle to say he was doing all right, though he clearly wasn’t. Betty Johnson silently stared from her place on the davenport. The last of the miners drinking at the Big Creek Store had left for home, drunk, but no wiser as to what had really happened at Sunshine. The Shoshone County coroner said all the men had perished within forty to sixty seconds of exposure to the toxic air, and all at 11:50 a.m. Betty thought the designated time was more convenience than science. She, and many others, refused to accept that all had died at once. Surely the men on the lowest levels had survived longer. Wives wondered if their husbands had suffered, and for how long?
In her empty bed in Big Creek, Joanne Reichert, the common-law wife of welder Jack Reichert, woke up in a panic. I should be at the mine where I can help Jack if he needs me. Maybe he needs me right now and I’m not there. Some women are unable to stay away from the men they love. Anyone who knew Joanne knew she was one of those. The long days and empty nights had eroded her already fragile mental state. She threw on some clothes, locked their dogs in the kitchen, and drove up the road toward the mine. A sliver of dark sky revealed a swath of stars beyond the clouds over the Bitterroots; a few windows beamed light across the roadway. Her heart pumped in time with her hurried pace. Out of breath at the portal, Joanne Reichert felt immediate relief. Jack hadn’t come out yet. Good. She didn’t want to miss him when he did.
She slipped between the clumps of people, thinking of how Jack was probably standing around somewhere in the darkness, waiting for the smoke to clear so he could come up, go home, and eat dinner. She pulled herself up on the platform backed with the huge safety sign and looked at the crowd. Their mouths were moving, like cattle chewing, with nothing intelligible emanating. Her hair was an unkempt mess, and dark circles dominated her weary, pale face like mascara smudges on a white pillowcase. She was erratic and emotional. She told people that she’d kill herself if Jack didn’t make it out of the mine. Several reported their concerns about her, and Jim Farris tapped out a note for Jack Reichert’s file: “Common-law wife stated she will commit suicide if Jack is pronounced dead. This threat should not be taken lightly in this case. . . . Her name is Mary Joanne and she has been seen in the yard constantly since the accident. She uses the last name Reichert.”
Forty-three
MORNING, MAY 7
Sunshine Mine Offices
CARLOADS OF MEN CLOAKED IN SUPERIORITY AND THREE-PIECE suits arrived on Sunday in search of motel rooms. Some were lawyers. They had briefcases, and secretaries they could dial to type their notes. Their hands had likely never seen really hard work. They were softer versions of those who mined, and they were concerned more with ensuring that the interests of their clients were preserved than with saving any lives. Others had an agenda that, at least on the surface, appeared to represent the miners. This was the union contingency, made up of men who were supposedly on the side of the miners who’d escaped, and those who were still underground.
Not everyone was happy with the United Steelworkers of America—locally or nationally. Ace Riley was among many who had long contended that hardrock miners were the bastard children of the Pittsburgh-headquartered Steelworkers. It wasn’t called, for Christ’s sake, the Hardrock Miners Union. It was named for men who worked on the surface, who hadn’t a clue about the dangers of the underground. Riley stewed. Not only had the father of five narrowly escaped a fire that killed dozens, but also, just two years prior, he’d seen a partner fall down a chute to a mangled death. As the smoke continued to pour from Sunshine Tunnel and the shortened blue steel stack, hope was ebbing toward resignation. Riley was pushed to the brink. When he was called to give a deposition, he went because he wanted to get some things off his chest.
By the time a Steelworkers representative introduced himself, the man from Butte was ready to blow.
“Let me tell you,” Riley said, standing tall and extending his index finger to punch out each word, “you sons of bitches, you sat on your asses and let things happen.” He railed against the inspection process. It was a sham, because warnings were always given that inspectors were on the way to the mine. A little clean-up here, move the powder from the station, check the cables of the hoist for any sign of wear, and sit back and follow the damn guy with a clipboard as he goes from topside to each working level. Don’t tell him that you gob with rags, ol
d boxes, and other combustible trash that should be hoisted out.
Topside, standing in the yard, physician Keith Dahlberg was still hopeful. Once men were rescued, they would be in need of medical attention—beyond smoke inhalation or any burns. One of his greatest concerns was starvation. Rescue crews carried Gatorade in ten-ounce cans and were admonished to give survivors the sugary liquid in very small amounts. The doctor distributed a memo:
“I suggest a quarter of a can every twenty to thirty minutes. Do not leave the [Gatorade] with the patient because he might not be able to use good judgment and would drink the whole can at once.”
He also worried about the impact of days of total darkness on a man’s mental state. He expected a form of hysteria. He wrote: “We don’t know how five or six days alone in darkness will affect a man. Morphine injection may be supplied to the first-aid man on the crew to administer if necessary. . . .”
The absence of light could send a man to the loony bin, or even to his grave, but there were tales of men surviving after lengthy periods of darkness. Speaking with reporters out in the yard, Marvin Chase pointed out that a Virginia coal miner had once survived an astounding three weeks without any light.
“The man was mentally and physically in fine shape when found by rescuers,” Chase said.
AFTERNOON, MAY 7
Sunshine Mine Yard
THE ASTRINGENT ODOR OF PINE-SOL AND LYSOL WAFTED THROUGH the floorboards of Sunshine administration offices. In the basement below the office was the shifter’s dry, and the men down there who’d been on body recovery were dousing everything that had to be cleaned—hardhats, rubber boots, slickers. Clothing was bagged and burned, with a new supply being issued by a mini–JCPenney store set up in the timekeeping office. The concern about contamination was genuine. At least four rescuers had been treated for rashes on their necks and backs. Whenever a whiff of fetid pine passed through the air, those who smelled it figured it was probably what death smelled like. Some would never be able to use pine-scented cleaning products at home again.