Chilean rescue workers have finished drilling an escape shaft for 33 miners trapped for over two months underground after a cave-in.
Engineers must now decide how much of the inside of the shaft to line with metal tubing before starting to hoist the men one at a time to the surface in special capsules, a task the government says will take from three to 10 days.
In one of the most complex rescue attempts in mining history, engineers have drilled down nearly 2,050ft (625m) to try to free the men.
It will take days to winch them to the surface one at a time in special capsules just wider than a man's shoulders.
Relatives and friends of the trapped miners, who have held candlelight vigils at the accident-plagued gold and copper mine in the far northern Atacama desert since the 5 August collapse, are waiting anxiously as the rescue bid nears its completion.
‘We're here waiting for them to give us good news,’ said Cristina Nunez, whose husband Claudio Yanez is among the trapped. ‘He is in good spirits and keeping busy to help time pass.’
Some of the men have sent keepsakes like letters, crucifixes and clothes sent down to them in tubes, back to the surface from the tunnel they called 'hell.'
Once the escape tunnel is finished, it will take from three to 10 days to get the men out, says Mining Minister Laurence Golborne, who has spearheaded the rescue effort.
After the cave-in, engineers initially bored narrow shafts the width of a grapefruit to locate the men.
When they were found 17 days after the accident, miraculously all still alive, celebrations sprang up across Chile.
Rescuers then passed high-energy gels, water and food down the narrow ducts to keep the miners alive.
Images caught on a video camera lowered down the bore hole showed the bearded men bare-chested to cope with heat and humidity deep in the small mine in Chile's mining heartland.
Trapped for 65 days so far, the men have set a world record for the length of time workers have survived underground after a mining accident. They are in remarkably good health, though some have skin infections.
President Sebastian Pinera's wife, Cecilia Morel, has travelled to the settlement called Camp Hope that relatives erected at the mine mouth, to help lend psychological support to the miners' relatives.
The government brought in a team of experts from the US space agency NASA to help keep the men mentally and physically fit during the protracted rescue operation.
The men had lost an estimated 10kg each during the 2-1/2 weeks before they were found alive.
