SAN JOSE MINE, Chile — Chile's trapped miners were shuttled up a narrow escape shaft(升降机) to freedom and joyous reunions(重聚) on Wednesday in a meticulously(一丝不苟地) planned rescue operation that ended the longest underground entrapment(被困) in human history.
One after another, the miners climbed into a missile-like steel capsule(密封舱) barely wider than a man's shoulders and took a 15-minute journey through 2,000 feet of rock to the surface.
All of the miners were freed Wednesday night in a rescue operation that advanced rapidly without hitches(意外障碍).
Scenes of jubilation(庆祝) erupted(喷发) each time a miner arrived to a hero's welcome above the San Jose gold and copper mine in Chile's northern Atacama desert.
The last miner out was Luis Alberto Urzua, 54, the shift foreman(值班长) credited with(被认为有某种优点) helping the trapped miners endure 17 days in isolation before Chileans discovered the men had survived the mine collapse.
"We have done what the entire world was waiting for," he told Chilean President Sebastian Pinera immediately after his rescue. "The 70 days that we fought so hard were not in vain(白费地). We had strength, we had spirit, we wanted to fight, we wanted to fight for our families, and that was the greatest thing."
The president told him: "You are not the same, and the country is not the same after this. You were an inspiration(鼓舞人心的人或事). Go hug your wife and your daughter." With Urzua by his side, he led the crowd in singing the national anthem(国歌).
"We were not only in the hearts of Latin American but in the hearts of the world," Pinera told the crowd about the "night of happiness."
Before Urzua came Ariel Ticona, 29, whose wife gave birth — to a baby girl named Hope, Esperanza in Spanish — while he was trapped underground.
Earlier, Franklin Lobos, 53,emerged with great applause. He was the only rescued man whose name was widely known in Chile before the disaster. Lobos played for the Chilean national soccer team that qualified for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
After 69 days underground, including more than two weeks during which they were feared dead, the men emerged to the cheers of exuberant(兴高采烈的) Chileans and before the eyes of a transfixed(入神的，惊呆的，钉住的) globe.