Vertical rescue at California mine

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Vertical rescue at California mine

Postby NZcaver » Apr 1, 2006 12:25 am

From the Bureau of Land Management website http://www.blm.gov/ca/news/newsbytes/xt ... safety.htm

"Stay on Designated Routes"

News.bytes Extra, 3/14/06

Staying on designated routes in remote public land areas of the California Desert became an important lesson for an OHV recreationist and his passenger who fell down a vertical mineshaft last weekend in eastern Imperial County (luckily, a broken arm was the only injury). Traveling off-road in a designated "limited use" area (where travel is restricted to identified safe routes), the two men spent Sunday afternoon and night -- 20 hours total -- down the abandoned mineshaft before being rescued.

BLM arranged to have the vehicle extracted. An investigation is underway.

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Last edited by NZcaver on Apr 4, 2006 1:47 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby Ralph E. Powers » Apr 1, 2006 6:23 pm

We've an open mineshaft that has the remains of a Jeep CJ in it. Story goes that these guys were (drunk) tooling around the area and zipped up this little hill (read: mine dump) and fell right into the pit/shaft at the top. There they sat until someone else likewise tooling around (all of this is in the dark of night okay... no, seriously... heard their cries for help while stopping to water some bushes.
The jeep remains are still there. unfortunately unable to get any decent pics. Shaft is approx 40-50 feet deep.
Without the possibility of death, adventure is not possible. ~ Reinhold Messner


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Postby RescueMan » Apr 2, 2006 1:27 pm

Ralph E. Powers wrote:Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. ~ Mahatma Ghandi


Zorba came upon an old man planting an apricot seedling and asked why he, an old man, was planting a new tree.

"I live life as though I would never die," was his reply.

"And me, I live as though I might die tomorrow," said Zorba, "which one of us is right?"

- Zorba the Greek - a play by Nikos Kazantzakis
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Postby Lava tuber » May 3, 2006 3:29 am

There is quite a lot of mines out that way half to be very careful
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Postby Baazalung » May 16, 2006 1:23 pm

RescueMan wrote:- Zorba the Greek - a play by Nikos Kazantzakis


Actually it's a novel :oops:
It's better down here than out there...
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