7: Alpha Centauri
Author: Chaoseternus
Chapter 13: Escape Part 1
The waiting medics set too urgently as the first of the trapped miners appeared at the top of the ventilation shaft, lifted up by the long steal cables set up by Angharad's rescue team on their way into the mine. Quickly, the survivors were grabbed; examined before being loaded into a hovering Paladin, ready to shift to the small planetside hospital.
All in all, of the 200 people trapped below, 10 had now been brought to safety. The medics shared uneasy looks as the ventilation fans frantically spun up to full emergency speed; things in the mine were getting bad, they need to get people out faster than this.
"Gas readings are building up far to fast for my liking, we need to get people out faster than this!" Henderson shouted, unconsciously echoing the thoughts of the medics a mile above him.
"We cant, we leave the fans off to long and the air will become saturated" Angharad replied, cursing as she carefully lifted another rock from the fall blocking access to Tarva's manhole.
"Air's becoming saturated anyway, the fans aren't keeping up, the coal seam is smouldering still, pouring carbon monoxide into the air, and somewhere there is a vent that's pouring firedamp into the mines, we need to evacuate everyone now!"
"We need the fans going to keep the air from reaching saturation otherwise we wont be able to get anyone out" Angharad replied.
"Shit! We're fighting a losing battle here"
"Tell me about it"
"O'Neill, the surface reports another ten have been safely retrieved from the mines" Teal'c spoke towards his long time friend.
"That's thirty of how many? 200? Plus the rescuers themselves? It's taking far too long" O'Neill replied, frustrated.
"Indeed, however several canisters of scrubbers were sent down whilst the fans were running, Carter believes they should buy the miners some time, but not much"
"Shit, why weren't rings set up in each of the mines?"
"I do not believe the rings would penetrate that deep underground, O'Neill"
"Well, something needs to be done, as soon as this is all over we need to have a word with the miners about safety procedures"
"Indeed"
"Angharad!" Angharad looked up as Henderson approached, "Another ten is ready and hooked up to go up in about ten, also we just got a report from Lower two, its bad, the coal seam is definitely cooking, if there was more O 2 down there it would definitely be on fire, several of the manholes were compromised, we lost at least 30 people, no way of knowing for sure just how many, we opened another manhole right next to where the fire was…" Henderson hesitated, "don't ask, just don't ever ask"
Angharad blanched, her mind rocketing to the obvious conclusion, and with a shudder she turned back to the chore of removing rocks from the fall.