Flowers and flags rest atop the cover of the rescue shaft at the rescue site in Lincoln Township, Somerset County, on July 21, 2004. (AP)
Story by PAUL PEIRCE
Tribune-Review
July 24, 2022
Four agonizing nights after the Quecreek miners were trapped underground, their families sought solace around a campfire outside the Sipesville Fire Hall. They gazed at the stars and prayed for a miracle.
Clinging to each other and their hopes for a good outcome, the families maintained a round-the-clock vigil, vowing to stay until someone could tell them something — anything — about the fate of their loved ones.
“Things were really getting pretty tense at that point because it had been so long … more than 70 hours,” said the Rev. Barry Ritenour, longtime pastor at the nearby Bethany United Methodist Church. Ritenour was called to the fire hall by state police just after the miners were trapped, and he stayed until the last man was pulled to safety.
There were times when hope waned, but the families were sustained by the support of those living in the small, mostly unincorporated farming communities surrounding the mine.
“There were just so many people willing to help,” Ritenour said.
Sometimes it was just a hand to hold or someone to talk to.
One person dropped off a pickup full of pizzas.
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Someone else pulled up in a truck jammed with Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
And someone from the community built that fire for the families to sit around, hoping it would bring them comfort to get outside under the stars after days of being cooped up indoors.
“I was proud to be a member of the community with the outpouring of support and the efforts to protect those families,” Ritenour said. “If somebody would get down, somebody would immediately be there (for them).”
At that moment, they supported their friends and neighbors, but just 10 months earlier, in the days following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, these same people rallied to aid grieving strangers after United Airlines Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville, just 10 miles down the road from Quecreek Mine.
“You’re thankful that there’s people out there with hearts that are good enough,” said Mark Zambanini, then-chief of the Sipesville Volunteer Fire Department.
Somerset County’s current emergency management director, Joel Landis, 44, was a fledgling emergency dispatcher in 2002.
Although he was off-duty when the call came in about the mine accident, he pulled extra shifts to help in any way he could.
“I remember receiving a lot of calls from people providing suggestions for the rescuers from all over the world, from London to North Dakota,” Landis said.
He said the suggestions, many highly technical, were logged, then forwarded to rescue headquarters “because you never know” what might be useful.
Landis was able to direct rescuers to the source of a critical piece of reinforcement pipe needed at the site, and through his second job at an ambulance service, he arranged for delivery of nine ambulances to stand by at the mine.
When those ambulances carried the rescued miners to local hospitals in the middle of the night, the roads were “lined with people … and there was a lot of cheering and a lot of happiness,” he said. “It still resonates with me after all these years.”
Ritenour can’t recount the story often enough about the moment when the families learned the miners were safe.
They were gathered around the fire outside the fire station that Saturday evening when suddenly the silence of the night was shattered by the sound of Gov. Mark Schweiker’s “big SUV bouncing up and down, flying up through the air toward the fire hall,’’ he said.
“I’m telling you, I’m not sure all the tires were touching the ground as it approached,” Ritenour joked.
Once the SUV stopped, Schweiker and John Weir, spokesman for Black Wolf Coal, the Quecreek mine operator, got out and ushered everyone into the fire hall, where Schweiker announced, “All nine are alive!”
The thunderous outburst of joy was so loud that those who were there swear it split one of the beams in the ceiling, Ritenour said.
“There were a lot of tears, a lot of hugging and a lot of cheering,” he said.
At that moment, the community had come together to realize what everyone believed was a true miracle, he said.
Landis said he couldn’t be more proud of his community and the determination and teamwork by local, county, state and federal rescuers.
“It’s one more example of this community showing the spirit and resiliency in the face of all odds,” he said. “It also shows we never give up hope.”
Paul Peirce is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Paul at 724-850-2860, ppeirce@triblive.com or via Twitter @ppeirce_trib.