SAN JOSE MINE, Chile — They’ll come up one by one in green overalls bearing their names on their chests – first the fittest, then the weakest, twisting in a steel cage that proved itself with four flawless test runs deep into the earth.

The dramatic endgame hastened Monday for the 33 Chilean miners who have braved two months underground, with rescuers reinforcing the escape shaft and the 13-foot-tall rescue chamber sliding, as planned, nearly all the way to the trapped men.

“It didn’t even raise any dust,” said Mining Minister Laurence Golborne.

If all goes well, everything will be in place late today to begin pulling the men out, officials said. The rescue team’s lead psychologist recommended the extractions begin at dawn Wednesday. No official decision was announced, but Andre Sougarret, the team coordinator, tweeted Monday evening that “today the miners sleep their last night together!”

On Monday, the Phoenix I capsule – the biggest of three built by Chilean navy engineers, named for the mythic bird that rose from ashes – made its first test run after the top 180 feet of the shaft was encased in tubing, the rescue leader said.

Then the empty capsule was winched 2,000 feet, just 40 feet short of the shaft system that has been the miners’ refuge since an Aug. 5 collapse.

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“We didn’t send it (all the way) down because we could risk that someone will jump in,” Golborne said.

Engineers had planned to extend the piping nearly twice as far, but they decided to stop after the sleeve – the hole is angled 11 degrees off vertical at its top before plumbing down, like a waterfall – became jammed during a probe.

Rescue team psychologist Alberto Iturra said he recommended the first man be pulled out at dawn because the miners are to be taken by Chilean air force helicopters to the nearby city of Copiapo, and fog tends to enshroud the mine at night.

It is a roughly 10-minute flight, said Lt. Col. Aldo Carbone, the choppers’ squadron commander. Ambulances will be ready for backup. The drive would take about an hour.

Officials have drawn up a secret list of which miners should come out first, but the order could change after paramedics and a mining expert first descend in the capsule to evaluate the men and oversee the journey upward.

First out will be the four most physically and emotionally fit, said Health Minister Jaime Manalich. Should glitches occur, these men will be best prepared to ride them out and tell their comrades what to expect.

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Next will be the 10 who are the weakest or are ill. One miner suffers from hypertension. Another is a diabetic, and others have dental and respiratory infections or skin lesions from the mine’s oppressive humidity.

The last one out is expected to be Luiz Urzua, who was shift chief when the men became entombed, said several family members of miners, speaking on condition of anonymity because they did not want to upset government officials.

The men will take a twisting, 20-minute ride for 2,041 feet up to the surface. It should take about an hour for the rescue capsule to make a round trip, Aguilar said.

Golborne said all would be ready by 12:01 a.m. Wednesday. Officials wanted to make sure the concrete around the steel tubing at the top of the shaft set, he said.

Plans call for a screen to keep the media from viewing the miners when they reach the surface.

After being extracted, the miners will be ushered through inflatable tunnels, like those used in sports stadiums, to ambulances that will take them to a triage station. Once cleared by doctors there, they’ll be taken to another area where they’ll be reunited with up to three relatives chosen by each miner.

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After the reunion, each miner will be driven to a heliport for the flight to Copiapo.

Iturra, who has tightly managed the miners’ underground lives to keep them fit and busy, turned his attention Monday to their families. Just as the miners will need time to adjust once they have surfaced, so will their families, he said.

Iturra recommended they leave the tent city where they have kept vigil, which is increasingly besieged by journalists. It sprang up amid piles of rock at the copper and gold mine isolated in the coastal desert of Atacama.

“They need to get their feet firmly back on the ground as well,” he said. “That’s why I sent them home to sleep.”

A torrent of emotions awaits the miners when they finally rejoin the outside world.

As trying as it has been for them to survive underground for 68 days, the mine is at least terra cognita. Out of the shaft, they’ll face challenges so bewildering that no amount of coaching can fully prepare them.

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They’ll be celebrated at first, magnets for a world curious to hear their survival story.

Contracts for book and movie deals are pending, along with job offers. More money than they could dream of is already awaiting their signature.

But eventually, a new reality will set in.

“Before being heroes, they are victims,” said University of Santiago psychologist Sergio Gonzalez. “These people who are coming out of the bottom of the mine are different people and their families are, too.”

For the loved ones awaiting the miners, news that the rescue tunnel was nearly ready brought both joy and anxiety.

Maria Segovia, whose brother Dario, 48, is among those trapped, said that when he is finally out, “I’ll tell him I love him.”

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Then, she said, smiling, “I’ll kick his backside” so he never goes into a mine again.

Chile’s government has promised each miner at least six months of psychological support, in part to deal with the sudden fame.

At first, they’ll feel poorly treated by the media and perhaps overwhelmed by the attention even of their own families, predicted Dr. Claus Behn, a University of Chile physiologist.

Society will “demand to know every minute detail, and they’re going to offer enormous quantities of money and popularity,” the doctor said.

Manalich insists the miners are unified, reflecting the disciplined teamwork that helped them survive, but all that could change once they are out.

One miner’s child was invited onto a Chilean TV game show, where she earned thousands of dollars, and 27 of the 33 workers have filed a $10 million negligence lawsuit against the mine’s owners.

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A similar suit against regulators is planned.

The money rush will be intense – and temporary.

The government required each miner to designate someone to receive their $1,600 monthly salary, and opened bank accounts that only the miners themselves can access.

But Behn said the miners need good financial advice as well so the money doesn’t melt away.

“If they’re getting now a violent inflow of money, it should be administered so that it can serve them for the rest of their lives,” he said.

 


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