Two In The Think Tank - 502 - The Beaconsfield Mine Collapse

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

For two weeks in 2006, Australia held its collective breath as a huge rescue effort attempted to save two men (Todd russell and Brant Webb) trapped nearly a kilometre underground at the Beaconsfield Mine in Tasmania. Joining us to hear about this incredible story of survival is our dear friend Evan Munro-Smith!This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 06:44 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).For all our important links: https://linktr.ee/dogoonpod Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present. REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:I Was Actually There (ABC):https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/i-was-actually-there/beaconsfield-mine-rescue-2006-todd-russell/103939258Head Game:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCgyZB9Bf-Uhttps://www.news.com.au/entertainment/music/foo-fighters-make-good-on-word-to-miners/news-story/2c8f6a5f84bedf8aa6fa4a0f7541e9c3 https://www.smh.com.au/national/rock-to-rock-foo-fighters-message-to-miners-20060506-gdnhjn.htmlhttps://web.archive.org/web/20081010054932/http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/10/07/2384587.htmhttps://www.chortle.co.uk/review/2009/01/01/35955/beaconsfield%3A_the_musicalhttps://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-02-26/beaconsfield-gold-rejects-inquest-findings/1602592 60 mins:https://youtu.be/IbAx4eis2qo?si=jCNgyG63DsX-WM2n60 mins (2016);https://youtu.be/LXC-LYD-4LU?si=mkbz_mr4HtLej0Er Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey mates, just Matt jumping in here to let you know that I'm coming to the UK for a tour this September 2025. I'm coming to Edinburgh, Cambridge. It's our first ever show there. Birmingham, Manchester, Swansea, first ever Wales show and London. I'm gonna be doing my show Bad Boy as well as a live Who Knew It with Matt Stewart in each of those places. Cannot wait. so pumped up. And also, while I've got you, our recent 500th episode, which we recorded live at the Capitol Theatre, that is now available to watch on our YouTube channel.

So just head over to our YouTube channel, do go on Pod, and check out all three episodes there. A whole lot of fun. And yes, grab tickets to Bad Boy and Who Knew It in the UK at mattstewittcomedy.com. Anyway, let's get on with the show. Hello and welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dev Warnocky and as always I'm here with Jess Perkins. I love you. Thank you.

No, that was to the listener. Oh, thank God. I was about to say- You are on thin ice. No, I was about to say, yeah, you too. Thank God I would have fallen for that one. So close. So embarrassing. Don't ever tell your friends you love them.

Why would you do that? That's so embarrassing. Never do that. Let your friends die not knowing how you feel about them. So we will not be telling this next person that we love them because they are our friend, our dear friend at that. It's Evan Monroe Smith, hello.

Hello, I'm so excited to be here. Hello. I've never told Evan I love him. That's not true. Not once. No, you tell me every time you see me, you tell me. Yeah. You told Evan I love him. That's not true. Not once. No, you tell me every time you see me, you tell me. Yeah. You said it more to him than probably any other human

being on earth. Yeah. Every time he leaves the room, as the door closes, I yell, I love you! That's true, that's true. One of my favorite bits. And sometimes I say it back. Yeah, you often do because you've learnt that if you don't, I'll reopen that closed door

and chase you down. That's right, your day will be ruined. So it's easier just to comply. It's easier just to say it, yeah. I'm happy being that person in my friend's lives. Oh, god. It's just easier if you just go with it. And it just shuts her up.

Jesus Christ. She's insufferable. Yeah, hi, Jess. Evan, we're so happy to have you here. What a treat. Yeah, what a pleasure. No, Matt Stewart this week. He is still missing. Still fine.

That's what you meant to say. He's fine. He's fine. He's fine. Evan, you know, it's funny you've heard of that. I genuinely I don't know why he's not here today. I mean, it could be because he's dead. I don't know. It could be. No one said that. Jesus.

No, but would anybody tell me? He's fine. No one would tell you. How would I find out? Someone would tell you. Someone would post on Instagram or something. That's how you find out. If that's how you found out that Matt Stewart died, would you not be a little bit miffed? Yeah, yeah.

Somebody would tell you, I reckon. No, Matt's just on Roadshow. Ah. Yeah. Just doing some gigs in regional Victoria. Comedy Festival tour, that's right. Yes, he's out there. Dead to us.

He's walking the boards. He's dead to us, but he's killing it. We know that. I say that like just. I just mean compared to being dead. He's not dead. He's at the boards. He's dead to us, but he's killing it. I say that like just, I just meaning compared to being dead. He's not dead. He's at work essentially, but it's also a great gig. We're very happy for him. Should mention if you live in country Victoria or like he's doing a bunch of

dates with the Melbourne Comedy Festival Roadshow, go out there see him. Yeah. And you can find out details. There's the comedy festival website if you look up Roadshow. And even if it's not Matt, road shows always good. That's right. I've done it. Yeah, I've done it. So I've done a bit of running around like filming and, you know, on those road show

things that are always a lot of fun. Awesome. Let's go see him. Go check it out. Now, Jess. Yes. What the hell are we doing here? What is this show?

Oh my God, Dave. It's been 500 times. How do you not know yet? I don't listen. This show is one of the three of us research as a topic, often suggested to us by our wonderful listeners. They go away, they live it, they breathe it, they watch a doco, they listen to an audiobook, they read the Wikipedia page. It's not true.

And they bring it back to the other two who throughout the story go, huh, or I've heard of that, or that reminds me of something. Yeah, there's a lot of that. And it's just a lot of fun. And it's Dave's turn and we always get onto the topic with a question. David, do you have a question for us? Yes, I do. My question for you, Evan, for you Jess, is with what event are Todd Russell and Brant Webb associated?

Beaconsfield Mine! It's the Beaconsfield Mine Collapse! You are correct! How did you know that? Because that story gripped a nation. Oh my gosh, you remember Evan? Those names are burnt into your head from when it happened? Yes, absolutely. I was watching the news. I've read about it. Oh, a harrowing and amazing story. This is great for me because I only vaguely

am aware of this. I don't know anything much about it. We've got a super fan. We've got someone who... Okay, I feel weird being a super fan of a pretty full on event. Yes. Yes. I might cry. Really? I don't know. I wonder if my... I have a favourite bit of this story and I wonder if you'll include it. I wonder too. Let's find out. I'll let you know when we get to it. Obviously, uh, don't say anything because I feel stupid that I didn't look it up.

Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. Just keep it to yourself. Cool. I bet this has been suggested by a few people, has it? Yeah. So this is the Beaconsfield Mind Collapse. It's photo for by our Patreon supporters. I put up four Australian topics and this one only won by five votes out of nearly a thousand. So it's very close. But the one that came second, also a great story that I'll get to one day. But the people that suggested this topic and anyone could do so, there's a link in the show notes. And these people did that. Gabe Hager from Fargo, North Dakota. Also Rachel Johnson from Melbourne, who was one of our Patreon supporters. And I always ask people to comment, of these four options, what are you voting for and why?

And Rachel wrote, I suggested it. That's a good reason to vote for it. So I'm glad that you voted for it too, Rachel. It got up. Georgia from Bellerat and Sophie Kime from Maitland, New South Wales. Interesting, because I was going to say, I wonder if this is a story that's known internationally, but there was a South or North Dakota. Yeah, there's a North Dakota was going to say, I wonder if this is a story that's known internationally, but there was a, it was a South or North Dakota. Yeah, there's a North Dakota and everyone else was from Australia.

Yeah. I'm interested to see if, uh, international listeners heard of this story. It was a big news story in Australia when it happened. Yeah. So it's like all anyone could talk about. It was all over the news for however long it went for. It was, it was a long ordeal. Um, and yeah, it was huge. And then even

after the fact, it was in the news for a long time. So Australia-wide, it's very well known. Except at Evan's house. Yeah. Yeah. Evan was probably- I have so many questions, but I don't want to preempt the thing. But what year was it? 2006. Okay. All right. I mean, I had other shit going on in 2006. Yeah. Why was I so interested? I was in high school.

2006. Yeah, I was in. That was my last year of high school. So many. It was just too many babes back then. I had exams. I had to get a form, I had to go to prom. I was the king. That's so interesting because I was like, I was going to say to you, Evan, I reckon I was probably so engaged in it because I was studying journalism at the time, but I was not.

I was in year 10. Yeah, wow. So that's interesting. I thought it was later. Maybe this is what got you into journalism and that's what got you into podcasting, kind of. Kind of. And here we are, not really using the degree, but kind of.

But kind of. And we're talking about that thing that you love. When I say I love it, it's like, oh, now I'm nervous that I don't know much. I don't have to. It's genuinely fascinating. I spent the week sort of deep driving on it and I was like, oh, I didn't know anything about this. Really?

I knew the story, of course, because it was, like you said, big news, but let's jump in. Beaconsfield is a small town in the northeast of Tasmania, about 40 kilometers north of Launceston. These days the population is only about 1300, but back in 2006 it was about 3,500. Mm-hmm. Gold was first discovered in the area in 1847, which of course started a gold rush.

Yeah. Underground mining began in 1879 with the sinking and development of three main shafts to access the gold reef. They were the heart shaft, the main shaft, and the grub shaft Because for a second I was like why is he mentioning these three shafts is this relevant it's cuz he wanted to say grub shaft It's so funny

What the grub shaft. It's full on. I couldn't find out why it's called that, but grub with a double B. What is it, heart, mane, and grub? Yeah. Okay. Mane kinda sucks, doesn't it?

You've got a heart. I was gonna say mane makes sense. I was gonna say heart almost makes sense. You'd have like it, maybe that's it. You gotta get your vessels and stuff. Maybe there's a... Yeah, you can say there's like intravenous little mind bits going off it, yeah. But grub, it's's it. You go get your vessels and stuff. Maybe there's a- Yeah, you can say there's like intricate little mind bits going off it, yeah.

But Grubb, it's double B. It could be named after a person. Yeah. Or a witchetty Grubb. Christine Grubb. Ha ha ha. Ah, Christine was great. She was one of the reception girls.

Oh, she's of good life. Yeah, tops you off. We love- We dedicate a shaft to her. We love Christine, so we named this Grubb. Love you, Chris. Get on your dowel. Those old blokes are called all women dowel. Yeah, get on your dowel.

Thanks, love. The area was worked on and off throughout the 20th century and in the 1990s, deep drilling with the grub shaft resumed after a permanent water pump was installed. Basically, I think the deeper they went, the more water they were encountering. So the wetter it got, the deeper you go. So, yeah. Helping pump out the water as the miners went hundreds of meters underground meant that with the pump, they could now go back and go real deep.

Yep. Okay. I didn't expect it to go this way. Really, I didn't. So, Anzac Day, April 25th, 2006. That's when this all kicks off. 34-year-old father of three, Todd Russell, had come off a night shift where he'd noted the ground of the gold mine was pretty noisy.

How old was he? 34. Right. Young. How old is he? Young. You are young. Equally young. Equally young. And which one is this? This is Todd Russell. Todd, thank you. Todd Russell. He means that it was

spitting and cracking whilst they were underground. Right. A rock actually fell and knocked his helmet off during this shift. Whoa. You know, could be a bad omen, bad sign of a bit of movement, but you know, just another day in the mine. It's not easy work down there. No. After his shift, he had to sleep, watched the footy and then thought about pulling a sickie. I've got to, I've got to go back tonight.

I've been working a lot. I can't be bothered. Yeah. He was super tired, but after thinking it over, he decided not, not to pull a sickie. This is such a classic thing. Isn't it? I was just like, I wasn't even going to be there that day. Yes, it is really like that.

Yeah. Yeah. I was this close to not, you know, not taking that train or whatever. Yeah. That's the one. And so he, you know, he decided, no, I'm going to, I'll go to work as always. He went along getting there at 5.30 for his 12 hour shift. 5.30 AM.

5.30 PM. Sorry. Oh, okay. Cause he's worked all night. Oh, right. Slept a little bit in the day. Working out. What's the foot he gone? I can't be bothered going back again tonight. You know what I'm saying? It's like day whatever.

So he was a shot fire, which is a specialist in mining who prepares positions and detonates explosive to break down rock and soil. So he's the explosives guy. Cool. Man, that would be a stressful job. Yeah, but also kind of fun. Yeah, kind of fun. But every time. Blowing shit up? Yeah. Sick. Like being allowed to blow shit up but every time- Blowing shit up? Yeah. Sick.

Like being allowed to blow shit up. Yeah, but being close to the shit being blown up, you might be a bit more scared of it. Yeah, but no one's mad at you for blowing stuff up. Yeah, that would be pretty cool. Yeah, the principal doesn't yell at you this time. Yeah, that's like, you can obsess with fireworks and you're like, all right. I fucking love fireworks. Fireworks are awesome.

Let me tell you. When we were young, like my dad had a friend for who- Young girl, you're still very young. Thank you so much. But when I was a child, like eight, nine, including the year 1999, of course, welcoming the millennium, dad had a friend that had a pool and he would have everyone over on New Year's Eve for a few years in a row. And a couple of times someone had brought in a bunch of fireworks set off in this guy's

big front yard and it was fricking awesome. That's the best. Especially when you're like nine years old and you're like right next to someone like, obviously I'm not setting it off, but I'm like, oh my God, it's over there. We did fireworks as a kid, a lot of fun. It was so awesome. They give it such a professional name though, Shot Fire. Shot Fire, yeah.

I like it. It should be, I don't know, blowing stuff up, Kai. The big boom man. Yeah, boom man. Boom boom. So, modern mines are extremely deep and they're big enough to drive large trucks. Like they're way, I was looking at videos. It's not like the mine shaft stuff of the gold rush with mine carts and that kind of

thing. Yeah, I was going to say, I've been to, like, I've been to mines, uh, into, I don't know, where do you go to? Ballarat? I've been to Ballarat. Yeah. You can go down to mines, uh, in Chib- I don't know, where do you go to? Ballarat? I've been to Ballarat. You can go down the mines, right? Um, obviously not active anymore, but they're like, they're big enough for, they're tight though.

Like they take, you know, small groups through and they're pretty tight to get through. But these are big enough to drive a truck. Yeah, you drive a truck down and what they do is a, uh, and this is what he, this is what Todd did. And you get a truck, I guess you drive the truck into it. Yeah, you drive it all the way down. It's not like a, cause it, cause again, when again, when I've been in mine shafts before, I'm no by no means an expert, but you get a lift.

It's a vertical hole in the ground. Whereas this, I suppose, is like a diagonal hole. You can get a lift down and that's how most of the workers get down, but to get the truck down there, there's a series of like kind of spirals. Like an airport car park. There was one, it's kind of like, oh my God, surely there's gotta be some spots on this level. Sometimes I get motion sickness

trying to get out of the fucking airport. Level five, no spots on level six, oh my God. Weaving our way down, I'm zooming down, let me tell ya. Kind of like that, with one of the, another gold mine, I was just watching a video of how it worked, some guy's job is to drive the truck all the way down, pick up whatever they've mined and then drive it back. And it's a two hour round trip.

Wow. Because you've got to drive pretty slow, but also you wind around and around and around about eight or nine miles of like round and round and round. And then they try and do it maybe four times in a shift. Yeah. So they're just driving up and back. In the dark, in a shift. Yeah. So they're just driving up and back in the dark, in the dusty. I'm also imagining that it's, it's big enough for the truck, but like only just.

So he drives all the way down, but then he has to reverse. How does he turn away? How much do I make there? Just hands over the back, the whole time. Just get an air. That's exactly it. So Todd slowly drove a loader about eight or nine kilometres spiralling down until he was 925 metres below the surface.

And they call that level 925. Okay. Okay. So that's about 0.57 miles underground. Right. For anyone overseas. So it's steep. Okay. So that's about 0.57 miles underground. Right. For anyone overseas. So it's steep. Yeah.

Once there he met up with his assigned team for the shift. There was 44 year old Larry Knight, who he already knew, and the guy he'd never worked with before that night, 37 year old Brant Webb. So they were sort of, you know, teamed up for the first time. And they were all going to work in a teleloader, also known as a telescopic handler, a teleporter, a reach forklift or a zoom boom. We're going to go with zoom boom. Thank you.

Sorry to speak on your behalf there, Evan, but I've made an executive decision. I liked teleporter, but yeah, zoom boom is great. Zoom boom is better. So basically it looks like a typical digger. Like one guy sits in a cabin and drives the thing and on the front is a long arm with a basket where the other two can sit or stand in. And the arm extends like a cherry picker so you get close to the walls or the roof for the mining or whatever.

Larry Knight and Brant Webb flipped a coin as to who was going to be driving and who was going to be in the basket with Todd. Larry turns out got to drive and Brant got in the basket with Todd. Fuck's sake. And this coin flip would be extremely fateful. Another one of those, you know. Do you know what kind of a coin it was? Was it a gold coin?

Oh my gosh. They have special gold coins made of pure gold. I just saw Evan's regret face. I've never seen it before. And it wasn't warranted. No, it was good. No, I don't know. I just saw Evan's regret face. I've never seen it before. And it wasn't warranted. No, it was good. No, I don't know. I don't back it.

Okay. Well, it's in forever now. You can't take it back. So Larry's driving, Todd and Brandon are in the basket, which like a cherry picker, is completely open at the top. It's only waist deep.

Okay. At 9.26 PM, a small earthquake struck. It only had a magnitude of 2.3 on the Richter scale. It was barely felt on land at all, but one kilometer underground and close to the epicenter, it triggered a rock fall. Wow. And it only lasted a second, but it was catastrophic. 14 others who were in the mine at the time were able to escape, but the rocks fell and buried were able to escape, but

the rocks fell and buried Todd, Brant and Larry. Everything went dark. And I mean underground pitch black dark. And everyone who talks about this story kept reiterating that unless you've been underground like that, you don't actually know what proper total darkness is. I'm not sure if they turn the lights off when you're in one of your many mine excavators. They did not. They did not. Like they say, like you can't see off when you're in one of your many mindless campaigns ever. They did not. They did not. Like they say, like you can't see two millimetres in front of your face. Like your eyes just never adjust because there's no light at all.

Like it's dark, dark. Todd's, you know, he's conscious, his cap lamp wasn't working, which is that typical light on a miner's helmet. And he started screaming out to Larry to get them the fuck out of there. You know, Larry's driving. There was no response from Larry. Miner's helmet. And he started screaming out to Larry to get them the fuck out of there. You know, Larry's driving. There was no response from Larry and there's also none from Brandt, who seconds earlier was standing next to him in the basket. He's like, Todd's like, what the fuck's going on?

It's dark. Where is everyone? No one's responding. It turns out Brandt has been knocked unconscious. He came to and fortunately his cap lamps still work. So they had light that they used sparingly to save the battery. Brant discovered that Todd was covered by and pinned under many rocks. Right. He was buried up to his head.

And apart from that, only his forearms were free. Geez. Not hardy. It's a genuine nightmare. Like, it's just the feeling of, like, the thought of being that far underground and trapped. It's like next level claustrophobia. Absolutely. In the dark. Oh, man. And like, like next level claustrophobia. Yeah. In the dark. Dark.

Oh man. And like it's, it's hot under there as well. Yeah. And it's moist. Hot and moist. Yeah. I just assumed it would be really cold underground like that. Yeah, no.

Yeah, right. And even, even when you're talking about like going to the mines in Ballarat and doing a tour, I'm like, fuck no. Absolutely not. Don't. On the tiniest chance to get stuck. I don't like being underwater. Yeah.

Like I like to have access whenever I want it to air and outside. Yeah. You just need to not, you need to put out of your head how deep underground you are. Yeah, absolutely. And it's hard when you're surrounded by rock when you're in a mine. It's easier when you, like if you drive through a tunnel, it's really easy to forget that you could be like quite a ways underground. Yes.

You just don't think about it. It's like being on a plane. Like you don't think about the fact that you're hurtling through the air. Yeah, that's true. Like an ungodly speed. And you don't notice cause it's such a gradual, like I'm thinking of like the, um, the tunnels at the freeway here. Like it's such a gradual decline.

You don't feel like you're traveling underground. It's only you start to feel it as you come back up. And it's mostly because other cars forget. And so they don't realize you're on an incline now, so they don't accelerate. So everyone slows down a lot. And you're like, why are we only going 60? It's like, well, because you've slowed right down because you're actually going, yeah, you're right. You go deeper than you think.

Wow. Like if you were to block either exit now, we'd be pretty deep. Yeah. So, Todd's pinned. Being a strong miner, he thought he'd be able to push it off, but every time he tried to heave himself up to get the rock off, he would then like struggle and then relax and breathe out after the effort. And each time the rock would get tighter and tighter on his chest. Awful.

Compressing him to the point that he struggled to breathe and he started to vomit. Cause he's like so pinned. It's actually on his chest. Todd, he- I'd be panicking. Yeah. Oh, me too. Big time. I'd be freaking, freaking.

Yeah. Todd, it's lucky these guys are quite experienced in being underground at mining. And Todd himself had worked in mines rescue. Right, okay. And he knew that he had to get out before he suffered a full on compression injury which could turn life threatening pretty quickly. So with Brand's help, they got the rock off slowly. It took like four hours. Wow.

But they had nowhere to put it except in their already confined basket which was only 1.4 meters square or as they describe it, about the size of a typical dining table. So it's 1.4 meters long and 1.4 meters wide. Yeah, right. That's not very big. But then they're completely surrounded by rocks, so once they take the rock off them, they can't put it to the side.

Yeah. So they have to put it somewhere inside the basket with them. With the extra rock, they had even less room. It now measured 1.4 meters long and for width Width they only had 70 to 80 centimeters or about 28 inches across. Right. That's not enough. They can't really move. And they're not small men. Yeah, there's a big dudes like Todd was You know a big mining guy said at the time he was 116 kilos. Yeah, and he's also a very tall dude Yeah, they're both tall and broad and like round men.

So, like, two Dave sized people could make that work. But these guys are big. Yeah, 70, 80 centimetres. Yeah. Yeah. And what is that in miles? Point zero, zero. Zero, zero, zero. Yes, 28 inches across.

This meant they only had enough width for one man to lie on his back, whilst the other had to lie on his side. Right. They only had enough width for one man to line his back whilst the other had to lie on his side And moving was very painful as the quartz walls that they were mining were like razor sharp So if you have to whoever's lying on their side and moving is like pinned against this wall And then if you're doing the switch to being on your back now, you have to scrape down the wall. Mm-hmm This sounds horrible. Why are they doing this? So they took to get out of there Just yell Larry get us out of here back now you have to scrape down the wall. Mmm. This sounds horrible. Yeah, it's awful. Why are they doing this? So they took two. Get out of there.

Just yell. Larry, get us out of here. I'm a celebrity, get me out of here. That's all you have to say. That's all you have to say. No, they won the $100,000. Yeah, that's right. Also the roof, which was made up of precariously balanced rocks that had fallen on top of them,

was just above, that only about 30 centimeters above their face. Jeez. It's like you can't really stand up, you can't really sit up. You can either lie on your side or lie on your back. Yeah. There are two options. And I guess it's just nothing you can't do anything.

You just you're just trapped. You just have to wait. Yeah. Wait for someone to hopefully come and find you. Yep. That's I mean honestly come and find you. Yep. That's, I mean, honestly, that is all they could do. So it was hot, it was wet, it was dark, but for now they were relatively safe. They took their helmets and belts off and tried to get as comfortable as possible.

And they passed the time by chatting. Like I said, at the start in the seventies working there, living in this tiny town, they'd never worked a shift together before. Yeah. That's crazy. And Now you're like well Who do you follow in the footy? Yeah, I was questioned stuff I they discovered quickly that they were quite different people top was quite serious Brant was a bit of a joker comedian

One man liked Ford or the other liked Holden Oh God, these two will never get one man like hunting and the other one he Holden. Oh my God. These two will never get along. One man liked hunting and the other one, he preferred fishing. Oh God. The regular odd couple. One thing they did have in common was their love for their families. Speaking about who was waiting for them back at home, kept their spirits up and their morale, well, you know, kind of high, relatively high, enough.

That's nice. They were both married. Brant had 18 year old twins and Todd, like I said, three younger kids, they were six, 10 and 12. And of course it wasn't easy. They were very aware that the rocks above them were super precarious and only had one shock or extra tremor to hit and it could shake the whole- Yeah, because there's always aftershocks, right?

Yep. Yeah. And it could shake him down on top of them and they'd be buried. Oh, man. Also, not surprising, there was a bit of bickering. Todd got pissed when he smelled that Brant was smoking in the basket. What? He was like, stop bloody smoking.

That's pretty funny. Eventually, however, he gave in and despite not being a smoker, he decided to join in being like, well, we're probably going to die in here anyway. Yeah. Give it a go. One good thing was the lighter also meant they were able to work out the direction air was flowing in and they had no need to worry about oxygen levels. That's clever.

Despite the rock being on top of them wasn't airtight so they weren't going to suffocate. They knew there was air. Okay, yeah, that's great. So that's one lesson to worry about. That's clever because again, I'm panicking. So I'm not thinking about, I'm not logically going, oh, well, I can see air coming in here. I'm not thinking like that. I think the other guy would have to knock me out because I'd be freaking out so much.

I'd be so unhelpful. Yeah. Yes, I think the other guy would have to knock me out because I'd be freaking out so much. Yeah. I'd be so unhelpful. Yeah. Yes, you would. Yeah. No. You might surprise yourself. You never know. Maybe.

I don't want you to ever be in a situation where you have to find out how you'd be in a life threatening situation. Probably fortunately for them, they don't know how long they're going to be there. That's right. They're like, well. It could be a few hours. They know something's happened. You know, they're on their way to help.

I won't spoil it for you, Evan, but if I told them this is how long you're going to be there, they probably would have freaked out. Yeah. Right. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I have no, I was, I keep fighting the urge to ask you how long are they down there for?

I don't even know if, I assume they get out because we're hearing about all this. Um, but I, yeah, it's, it sounds like quite, they're in for quite an ordeal. Yes. It's a lot. Because the mine was so wet, they had access to dripping water and used one of their helmets to collect it. Oh, wow. Although this was slow and-

They got bloody everything you need. They got air, they got water. They got a bed, kind of. They got a razor sharp rock wall. Bedrock. You got a mate? What more do you need? What more do you need?

You're not doing any chores down there. Yeah, jeez. You don't have to clean the toilet. Oh, yeah. Good to get back to the bloody more do you need? You're not doing any chores down there. Yeah, jeez. You don't have to clean the toilet. Oh yeah, good to get back to the bloody kids. They're probably still getting paid. Yeah.

Oh yeah. Surely getting overtime for this. Imagine the overtime on this. Surely. Surely. Though it was painstaking and slow to collect the water because it took about two hours to get a single mouthful. Oh my god.

It was like a classic slow drip, Stalactites, stalactimites style situation. Stalactites, stalactimites. That's actually in the rhythm of one of Matt Stewart's jokes. Yeah. He's talking about man caves. Yeah. Check it out on his standup special on the Stupid Old Channel. That's a bloody good joke.

Full of stalactites and stalactimites and bloody ice-fritching. Making fun of man caves. Good stuff, Matt. We miss you. And we, we wish you well. We wish you well. Wherever you are. So that's why, remember they got two helmets.

In my helmet they collected water. In the other, they collected their piss. Just in case things got desperate. Oh wow. Okay. But you don't want to get your helmets mixed up. Piss in the water rules. No, and it's very dark.

Fortunately, they say they never had to drink the piss. Thank God. They would say that. You would say that. I'd say I'd take that to my grave. I would. No, no, never had to drink the piss. No, no, no, no, no. Nope, definitely not. So the thing about, I knew this story and that they were trapped for a while.

I didn't realise that they were in this tiny little area. I thought that they, maybe it's like the entrance is over there, a rock has fallen down there, they're in a, you know, a bedroom and they can walk around, they can lie down, they can stretch. I didn't realise that it is literally claustrophobia on steroids. Yeah, it's like they can barely move. Yeah, I didn't realise that that's how bad it was. It was bad.

Yeah, so bad. Because they're still in the cage of the- Yes, it's just a cage. it's still in the cherry picker. The small cage. Cherry pickers aren't big. Oh, like, you know, and it only goes up to their waist. That's not, it's not very big. Yep.

So they don't know what's happened to this other, the driver? No, they've yelled at him. They can't hear him. They haven't heard anything back. Yeah. All right. As for food, it was pretty slim pickings. Brant had a muesli bar with him, which he offered to...

Oh, wow, that's lucky. ...offered a cut in half and share with Todd, which is very nice. Very nice. You know what? I'm not a big muesli bar fan. What do you say? I'm okay. You're really? It'll be wasted on me. Yeah. Don't like them.

I don't know what kind it was. I don't know. 2006, it wouldn't have been any of those, it wouldn't have been like one of the Carmen's ones with the 10 grams of protein or anything. It's probably a pretty crappy Uncle Toby's. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause you get those ones that are like oats and chocolate chips. You're like, this isn't healthy.

This isn't really... It's got oats. Yeah, they're nice though. They are not. Yeah. Is there genuinely anything that you'd be starving underground? You'd be like, I don't want to eat that. I hate it so much. Honestly? Yeah.

Musely bar? Most things. Most things? Yeah. Most? Most things. I things? Yeah. Most? Most things. I mean, there would be, there's some stuff that I just, I just can't get like, I'm not big into like seafood-y like just-

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not very adventurous with food. Imagine if it was like oyster. Oh, thank goodness. I've just remembered I've got a bag of spaghetti marinara in my pocket. That is the funniest choice you could have made. Spaghetti marinara. Look, I would probably go for that, but like I, I watch, um, I've been watching Alone Australia. But I, I dunno, the idea of just eating like a raw animal meat or like cooking, you know,

like processing animals. You'd find a half a rabbit's carcass. Yeah, I wouldn't. I wouldn't be. It'd be a while before I get that desperate. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't eat meat. So yeah. I love Jess's standards are so high.

She's like, Musely bar. Yeah, I know. Because again, I'd be assuming we're here for a couple of hours. Yeah, I'll be hungry. I'll get out and I'll be like, I really regret eating that Musely bar. I can still, it's still in my teeth. Have you got any floss? I hate the... I wish I liked them.

I don't like the, like, I don't like oats. I hate the taste. Really? Yeah, I know. It's really annoying. I love oats. I hate them. I love them too, yeah.

Me and Matt used to get, like, lunch when we were at work. We would always go to the cafe down the road and we'd get, they did like porridge with honey and banana. Great. I mean, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like,

I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, Me and Matt used to get like lunch when we were at work, we would always go to the cafe down the road and we'd get, they did like porridge with honey and banana. Great. Big fan. Yeah. And then they stopped doing it. What?

Why would you do that? We were in there like every day getting that. And then they took it off their menu. And there was a little while there where we were like ordering off menu because we knew them. We were like, can you still get the porridge? And they did for a bit, but. One day they have to be like, can you still get it? You know, can you still do the porridge? And they did for a bit, but.

One day they have to be like, we can't be bothered doing it. Well, ultimately they went out of business and I think it's cause that they took the porridge off the menu. Yeah. But it's also like, do you think at any stage they, they were like, we're kind of sick of these two dickheads coming in. They were trying to get rid of us. Yeah.

I'd take that personally. And then they were like, the only way to get out of this, we've got to pack up the whole business, we've got to fake a bankruptcy. We've got to go. Let's just move. I'm still friends with one of them on Facebook. That's weird, right? Send a message. Do you know if they own another cafe now?

I don't think they do. Go find them. And order the porridge. Yeah, order the porridge. Go round to their place and pour it. So they've got one Musely bar split in half. Initially they agreed to wait 24 hours to eat it. That's smart. I was going to ask how long until you pull it out.

You wait until you're hungry. A couple of hours. They waited 20, so 24 hours. They said 24 hours, but they continually extended the time until they decided to finally eat it four days later. Four days? On April 29th. Oh my God.

We lined that food for four days. Four days? April 29. Oh my god. We lined their food with that food for four days. Four days? Then they ate small pieces of the bar at a time to make it last as long as possible. However, Todd Russell later lost a large portion of his half when it fell out of his pocket. That'd be devastating. Oh man. He'd be so upset and Brant would be like, he just lost my fucking muesli bar. Oh my god. I mean, I, I feel devastated if I'm just eating like a normal meal and I drop a little bit and the dog's got to eat it off the floor. Yeah.

That hurts me. But the dog is stoked. The dog couldn't be happier. But does it hurt you to see the dog enjoying it? Yeah. Evan hates that dog. I got the food, I want to eat all in dragons? Yeah. Evan hates that dog. That's why I got the food. I want to eat all the food.

Yeah, that's my food. Yeah. This is all the food you have in the world. Yeah. And you're hungry. Oh, that would be. Four days without eating. Man.

And then you drop it. Soul crushing. Harrowing. Yeah. Almost as soul crushing as the rock crushing you. Yeah. That's right. Oh, man.

Four days. Evan, let me tell you. It's going to get worse. Four days. I still, I mean, I still have no, I can't, I still have no idea how long they were in the four in the end, but four days sounds, I mean, I really didn't think it would be that long. Four days.

Yep. All right. Well, they also extended their light by taking the battery out of Todd's smashed cap lamp and carefully fire. They used a lighter for light lighting this and then putting it into branch. So they had another battery, which is clever. So they're clever. Yeah.

They're good at like obviously surviving. Yeah. As best they can. Problem solving. For six whole days they lay there. Wow. They could hear manmade explosions going on knowing that that was the rescue effort. Yeah, okay.

You'd be pretty pissed if you thought that was still marketing. Just carry on. That would be encouraging. Like you can, you're hearing, if you heard nothing, you'd eventually, you'd just go insane, right? But if you're hearing something, you'd be like, all right, let's progress. Someone's coming. And they're-

Just hoped, right? It gives you hope. They're yelling out, they're banging on the metal cage with tools, just trying to let people know that, hey, we're over here. We are alive. Also, they wanted them to be careful to not trigger another collapse because they're hearing explosives and they're like, holy shit, man. We're like in a house of cards here.

You can't be setting off explosives. Using a pen to write on the legs of his overalls, Todd wrote down the time and date from his watch of every explosion so that if rescuers did trigger a collapse and later found their bodies, they would know how long they'd been alive for and what it had triggered there. Wow, he's very smart. Wow. Yeah, right. Okay. So, oh, right. Okay. Whoa. It'd be like, you know, April 29, 1043 AM explosion. And they'd later find his ovals and be like, holy crap, they were still alive until the 29th.

Yeah, wow. On his other leg, Todd wrote a goodbye letter to his family, which was understandably one of the hardest things he ever had to do in there. To keep up morale, they sang a song. Remember, they're pretty different. Pretty different guys. They don't have too much crossover with what music they like. They're only one song they both knew the words to and Jess seems to be trying to remember

it. Do you know what it was? No, I don't. Maybe if you gave me a clue. It is a Kenny Loggins classic. They kept singing The Gambler. Oh. You gotta know where to hold them.

Know where to fold them. That's the only song they both know the words to. Know where to hold them. No where to fold them. That's the only song they both know all the words to. Yeah, wow. So they just start singing it like, just blaring at the top of their lungs, having a real fun. Yeah. I like that they're going through like,

their little catalogs in their brain of, do you know this song? Yeah. Do you know this song? How long would it take to get to that? Yeah. I don't know if there's many songs that I know all the words to.

Mary had a little lamb. Surely you know this one. Nothing. Nothing? Don't know that one's many songs I know all the words to. Mary had a little lamb. Surely you know this one. No, nothing. Nothing? Don't know that one. What was your childhood? Do you know Missy Higgins' Scar? I know that one.

Oh no, I know the special too. Damn. Two great tracks. I'm trying to think of songs I know all the words to and Scar is one of them, I think. Right. I can't think of many at all. Which I don't feel. Even if you just be like, hey, do you want to do the chorus of, I don't know, Mr. Brightside? We all know that. Just do the chorus. We don't have to know the verse.

And honestly, if my husband's taught me anything, it's that you don't have to know the lyrics to songs. Yeah, just to make it up to a bit of like, that, that, that, you know. Yeah. In fact, you don't have to hear any lyrics to songs. And then you go, oh, Brant, freestyle. I'm like, Dave, I'd love to be stuck underground with you. Imagine you're stuck with someone whose hobby is beatboxing. Let me show you what I can do. Sorry, when I get nervous, I beatbox.

Oh, that'd be great. So they're like over and over, they're singing the Gambler by Kenny Loggins over different times throughout the day, which I love. It's such a great visual. Really ruining the song for themselves though in the future. Oh my gosh. If they do survive this, you'd be like, I don't want to hear that song again. Oh yeah, that'd be traumatic. Yeah, it would really bring you back there.

What they didn't know, and probably fortunately for them while at this stage, is that a remote controlled Earth mover had been clearing the rock underground on their level and on day two the body of Larry Knight had been discovered and retrieved. Oh, I could have forgot that Larry. Yeah, tragically, he was only 44. And remember they'd done the coin toss. Yeah.

That's sad. I thought what you were gonna say was what they didn't know is that they could hear their singing. Yeah. Oh, right. And they were toned there. Thanks. I had a really vague memory of them finding Larry

and he was having some sort of medical episode and they got him out, but he did not make it. No, Sal. I think he'd been killed in the initial rockfall. Which I mean, horrific. The whole thing is awful and such a tragic loss, but in some ways you go, if he went quickly. Yeah.

If you are going to go in this situation, you want it to happen. Yeah. Straight away. Not that he was there in pain, slowly dying, that would be horrific. Yeah, so. Oh, I'd forgotten that, that sucks. And they both, so they didn't know each other, but they both knew and had worked with Larry. Yeah. Right, right.

Yeah, yeah. So it's very sad for them in particular. After his body had been found, the area was turned into a crime scene for investigation, just standard protocol. So mining inspectors were put in place throughout the mine and basically, it sort of slowed down the rescue a little bit because they had to sort of now treat it as a crime scene as well as- Oh, because they- A rescue scene. Because someone had died.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And I guess they're doing like a- someone dies at work, there's an investigation. What's happened here? Get work safe down there, yep. So on the 9-2-5 level, which is where they'd entered and Larry and Todd and Brandon had been working, one of the mine inspectors was stationed to prevent anyone going in at that level because that's where they found Larry. A couple of miners who were mates of the trapped men were pretty keen to

get in and have a look. Now they weren't allowed in there, but the minor who was the inspector said he was having a coffee and I'll be back in 15 minutes. Sort of a wink wink. Yeah, right. Now you boys. Yeah, you don't, don't you go in there. You are not allowed down here and you know that. Now off you go. Off you go. I won't be here.

I'm going to the tea room and I'm going to have a cup of tea at a Bickey, maybe use the little boys room. No one's going to be here looking for about 15 minutes, so don't you come in. Now I don't want to come back and find that you're having a little cheeky gander. Off I go. That is exactly what I said. And then one of them turns the other one goes, well, I guess we can't look. Gosh.

You heard him. You heard him. The other one's like, you are the densest motherfucker. So meanwhile, he's off for a break. Two miners at their own extreme risk went into 925 to investigate and quote, do a risk assessment. So they described it. They were about to do another blast and they later found out that this possibly could have

killed Todd and Brandt because they were getting closer and closer and that they've got this precarious rock situation above them. But they know that like, they know Todd and Brandt didn't come out. Yep. So, yeah, why would you be so cavalier with more explosives? I guess because they found Larry dead and it's been several days. I think it's been four days and they're starting to think, I think part of the logic is we're really running out of time here.

We have to find these men. If they're in there, I guess it's a calculated risk. At this point they're sort of, they're expecting to recover bodies not, it's not a rescue. I mean, you know, at the time you'd be like, this is pretty unlikely that they're going to find these guys alive, right? you know, at the time you'd be like, this is pretty unlikely that they're gonna find these guys alive, right? Yes, yep. You wouldn't necessarily assume that they've got air and most of them easily bar and water.

Like you wouldn't assume that they're gonna live. Yeah, yeah. I mean, the chances that they aren't crushed to begin with and then the chances that they've been able to survive this long is pretty slim. Yeah. It's pretty amazing really. Yeah. It's actually unbelievable that've been able to survive this long is pretty slim. Yeah. It's pretty amazing, really. Yeah. It's actually unbelievable. Yeah. That they're able to survive.

So, and they're oblivious to people being so close because they're surrounded by so much rock. They're basically in what they felt like was a soundproof room. Yeah. It must be just a few metres away, right? Yeah, they're just a few metres away. And they were lying there, loudly singing the gambler. You gotta know when to hold him. When Todd thought he heard something.

So he told Brant, shut the fuck up. And Brant's like, what? He's like, I think I heard someone. He yelled out, is anyone there? And these are the rescuers that have come closer. Yeah. Yeah. They couldn't believe it.

And they reportedly collapsed with joy when they heard the trapped men's voices respond. Like they both yelled out, are you there? Yeah, I'm here. Can you hear me? Oh my God. So they know that they're alive and that the people have found them. So one of the rescuers yells out, can we get you anything? And Todd responded, can you get us the fuck out of here?

Not a bad point from Todd. And everyone laughed. And Todd's the serious one. He's the serious one too. Oh yeah, I'd love a Pepsi Max and to get the fuck out of here. That's good stuff. That's great. There was quite a bit of humor like that, sort of gentle ribbing each other.

Yeah. Well, because you'd be, I mean, obviously the whole thing's just horrific, but that would be a moment of just elation that someone can hear you and that you're talking to your mate and they know you're alive. So it was great news. The two men were safe after six days, particularly for the anxious families waiting at home. And a later interview with one of their wives had talked about, it must have been Todd's wife because he's got three kids, like there was a mixture of in the family, some of them were like,

Dad's alive. Another one was like, I don't think Dad's there anymore. And it was like this was extremely emotional six days. One of the kids kept going to school because they needed a distraction from the around the clock worry. Yeah. But very long, very long six days for them in particular. And they were informed that, hey, they're alive in there. And by this time, the media storm outside the mine had exploded.

Yeah. Now, if you weren't in Australia at the time, it is hard outside the mine had exploded. Yeah. Now, if you weren't in Australia at the time, it is hard to describe, but it was huge news and it's all anyone could talk about. Front page of all. OK, this is how I know it was 2006, because I was about to say front page of newspapers. Yeah, and you know, that's a big deal. I'm not looking at fucking newspapers now. So I must have been living at home where newspapers were.

Yes. Yeah. Front page of newspapers, main story and probably the only story on most news channels. Yeah, like, you know, the morning shows are all now based in Tasmania to be like covering it. Yes, every round the clock. Around the clock. Great for Launceston. Oh, huge.

Interviewing all their old, like, you know, people that know them, that kind of stuff. Yeah. All that sort of bullshit. And now they've been found against the odds alive after six days. It became worldwide news. Yep. Like it was, you know, now worldwide coverage. And I'm wondering if people from overseas do remember it.

Yeah, maybe from that point on, yeah, where they were found alive. Were the media like, they were, I guess, up at the surface level. They weren't like down there. No, they couldn't get down there. They weren't communicating with them. No, but at the top of the mine, like, you know, there's all the satellite trucks. Yeah. Broadcast trucks are all there.

Yep. Like it became like a mini city. Yeah. Some people estimate that the town population had like basically doubled from three and a half thousand. Huge. Huge news. Caravan park couldn't handle it.

They're licking their lips. Yeah, like, oh, bloody hell. I think there were three pubs back then. Now there's only one left in the area. But everyone was asking how are they going to get them out? And knowing they were alive actually- And you really don't want to kill them. That's such a good point, Evan.

But that is exactly what happened because knowing they were alive actually ground the rescue to a halt because authorities were aware that if they made the wrong move, it could cost them in their lives. Yeah. I mean, it's the kind of thing where like, if you don't, if it's like, well, they might be alive or they might not be, you're there blowing it up. But you're like, well, what can you do? Exactly. We've got to try. But if they're alive, it's like, this is... Yeah. Now we've got to be really careful. Yeah. We've got to get there before they starve and now we know they're there. Okay. Let's all relax a bit. Yeah. Let's find... Let's slow this down. Let's do this proper.

And they had 25 people in a control room on the ground painstakingly going through all the details of potential rescue plans, all the pros, all the cons, trying to figure out the safest way to do it. Yeah. But that takes time. Of course. Yeah. Later.

They're doing DROs, dynamic risk assessments. Yeah. OK, they're ever changing. Wow. It's pretty interesting stuff. Those dynamic risk assessments. Yeah. Okay. They're ever changing. Okay. Wow. It's pretty interesting stuff. I would have had so many engineers down there. Right?

Yeah. Geological. Room full of bloody engineers. Fantastic. And some people like come up with crazy plans like, all right, what we need is a nuclear weapon. We need to explode this mine. Okay.

What we're going to do is we're going to put a Captain America shield in, hand it to them, they just hold it above them and then we just blow the shit up. Yeah, that'll be fine. They will be fine. I've seen the movie. It's made of uranium or whatever the fuck it's made of, I don't know. Later on, one rescuer found a direct route to the trapped miners across the rubble in the side tunnel. He was actually able to get close enough to the basket of the telehandler to shake Todd

Russell's hand. Whoa. This was where a remote control loader had got to the back of the teleloader, but the route was deemed unsafe for rescuing them. So it was just too much rubble around that could potentially collapse on them and the rescuers. Yeah. So it's like, we can get close here, but if I move this a little bit here, the whole thing will collapse.

Yeah, you don't want to put a whole bunch of other people at risk. Yeah, mine manager Matthew Gill told the media, we have carefully and seriously considered the option of going through this way to get Todd and Brandt, along with all the other options attempting to come through the back of the tally handler, seen as a very unsafe option both for the rescuers and for Todd and Brandt. So that's pretty frustrating, though. You can like literally shake a hand. Yeah. You're close enough to touch another human.

Yeah. But you just can't get through that wall. Brutal. Todd and Brandt had passed on as many details of their position as possible, including how far the basket was extended during the collapse, so the rescuers could calculate exactly where they were. The rescuers then drilled five meters below the men and then created a narrow shaft up to them, which they fitted with a PVC pipe so they could send supplies up to them.

Yeah, right. Everything was sent. It was so small, everything was sent inside a Mount Franklin 600 mil plastic water bottle. And it would just go up and down. It's got to go up, so you got to like put the bottle in and then go like, whoo! Like on a mini golf course. Yeah, I assume. How else would it go up?

I think it's, yes. I think it was a series of pulleys. Pulley, pulley, pulley, slash someone going, whoo! So they were sent medical supplies with which, um, Brandt was able to treat the injury to Todd's leg with advice from paramedics. Oh. And they were able to communicate because the telephone was sent through in pieces in a plastic bag with a screwdriver and instructions on how to put it back together.

Oh my God. And from this point on, they basically had one of them on the phone at all times. Yeah. So one might lie down for a rest and the other one would stay on the phone. Sadly, they couldn't call home and speak to their families. That's going to be my question. Yeah, I assumed that you would. Part of the reason, this is what they say, is that they were worried the media were tapping

the lines. Fuck. So they- Well, just give the wives the other phone. Like, you're speaking to them mobile to mobile. I reckon the girls probably aren't at work. Probably bring them down and hand them the phone for a sec. Yeah, yeah.

That's just my idea. Bizarre. So they sent letters back. I'd be, if I was one of those wives, I'd be fucking storming that place. I don't give a shit if the media hears this. I want you to go talk to them in case they die. They also sent letters. So they sent letters back and forth to their families instead.

And these were monitored by psychologists before they went down to make sure there was nothing that would trigger them in. And my theory is actually that they can control the letter, but they can't control what, like, you know, your six-year-old says on the outside that might cause you to have a bit of a mental collapse. True. Daddy, I miss you so much, whatever, and you'll like panic attack. Actually.

That's my theory. No, you're right. Okay. Yeah, you're absolutely right. But with a letter they can read it and go, this is too much. This could really upset them. They're even speaking to their wives, even a step before the kids. The kids would break them, but even talking to their wives.

Can I tell a quick story? Yeah. My mom's best friend was in Christ Church at a medical convention when the earthquake hit. Uh huh. And, uh, we're watching it on the news like, Oh wow, earthquake in Christchurch, that looks bad. And my mom just goes white and she's like, Kay's there. And we're like, fuck, get onto her husband. He, we had eventually heard from her. She was okay. Kay is a very like tough, no bullshit woman. I absolutely adore her. And she eventually got extracted. She got out and mom and dad were at the airport when she landed

back in Melbourne. This was like several days later and it was a horrific time. The hotel she was in was destroyed and it was terrible. And like some of her colleagues had to, It was terrible. Yeah. Wow. And like some of her colleagues had to... There was a story of somebody, a urologist amputating someone's leg to get them out of rubble. And they were a urologist. They were not a surgeon, but she was small and she could get in to do it. Right.

While a surgeon was on the outside instructing the guy and they saved the person. Like it was a horrific time. That's not a surprise to anybody, particularly New Zealanders. Instructing. Instructing. Oh my god. And they saved the person. Like it was a horrific time. That's not a surprise to anybody, particularly New Zealanders. Anyway, she gets back and she's this very tough stoic woman, but as soon as she saw her husband, she just broke, right? Because it's like you're holding on for so long and then there's this person that represents like safety to you and you know, you can just let go because they've got you now. And so it would have to be from a psychology point of view why they would

withhold speaking to their family because you're still stuck and then you hear your kids it would it would it would be awful. Yeah. It would be so hard to hear. Yeah it would. Yeah but on a logical level as humans on the outside, we're like, let them talk to their families. Please, this could be the last time they ever speak to them. Right?

But yeah, it's like, is it going to do more harm than good? Cause we don't know how long they're going to be in there for. Yeah. It's interesting. I said earlier that I've been watching alone Australia and so many of them end up giving up because they just miss their family too much. It's like it's, you know, they go in there being like, I can do this. I'm going to stay the longest. I'm going to stay for, you know, three months. I can stay for a year. And I

think all of them would go in being like, well, as long as I've got food and water, I'll be fine. But some of them, even if they, you know, it's not the, it's not, it's not the food thing. It's not, it's not, you know, they've got water and they've got shelter and stuff, like it's hard, but like they can survive. But so many of them are just like, fuck this, I need to see my family and see my kids. And I guess that's the situation obviously where they're making the choice to be there. They have the option to just be like, no, I'm out of here. These guys don't get to just leave. Yeah.

That's usually what it is, is that they just miss their family so much. I don't know if it would help if they could talk to their fam. I feel like it would make it worse. Maybe, yeah. I really do think it would make it worse if you could talk to them. I did a real 180 there because I was like, get the fucking wives on the phone. Yeah. And I'm like, ah, actually, yeah, I can see that.

I felt mad. I'm like, just because I was thinking, what if it is the last time they ever and they missed the opportunity to say, oh man, it's a tough call. I don't know. I would be storming the place. They're actually really like monitoring them to the point that Todd asked for a photo of his family as they'd recently taken family photos. And when he was first crushed, he said the thing that gave him the will to live, he was

at first, he was like, like praying. He was in so much pain covered in rock. He was like, I hope I go soon. And then he sees the image of the family photo that they'd taken recently and that's when he started trying to break out. Stop this. But a psychologist wouldn't let him have the image worrying how it would affect his mental health. But they did get fresh clothes sent to them every day. And on the rescue-

In Mount Franklin. Yeah, isn't that wild? Well, you can really see that. It just proves, you know, people say roll your clothes when you're packing. They say that. They say you get more space out of it and I think they might be right. I did say Six in a Real now. Maybe it was a big Mount Franklin.

Yeah, 1.25 litre. It must be a big one, right? But on the rescue team was one of Todd's close mates, a guy called Dean Mackerel, what he calls Macka, who one day- I love Australians. So good. Who got on the phone after sending through some fresh tracksuit pants, and Dean told Todd to check his pockets, and inside he'd smuggled in a small photo of the family. No!

Oh. Macka! And yeah, Todd put it about 30 centimeters away from his face up on a rock and he, and this, it actually did the opposite of what the psychologist was worried about. It gave him strength. He would look at the photo and go, all right, we've got to stay calm. Here's the thing too. These are miners in their 40s or whatever, like late 30s, 40s.

You know, these are the guys down in the pub like, yeah, no, it's completely like surface level conversations or yeah, no, Macarey is a good bloke. Yeah, whatever. But then like that is so sweet and thoughtful. So nice. Of like, fuck these guys. He needs a picture of his kids. Like that's really nice. Yeah. What a legend. Maca. Oh, they're also later sent a digital camera to take some photos of their surroundings so the rescuers could see what they were dealing with. And some of these photos

survive, which is crazy to see them just sort of surrounded by rubble. Yeah. They also got a torch, magazines, deodorant, toothpaste, and iPods, which included requested music from Foo Fighters and the Australian musical comedian, Kevin Bloody Wilson. Which is so funny. Okay, so that tells you what we're dealing with. Yeah.

Do I look like I give a fuck, Dilligaf? He's like, I gotta keep the spirits up. Yeah. So great. I'd be like, put Carl Barron on one for me. I'll just listen to one of these cents. When Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters heard of the Miners' request to have the bands music sent down on MP3 players, he issued a personal message via fax.

What? It's 2006. Wow. So great that they can't talk to their wives, but you can take a fax from Dave Grohl. Grohl's note in part read, though I'm halfway around the world right now, my heart is with you both and I want you to know that when you come home, there's two tickets to any Foo's show anywhere and two cold beers waiting for you deal question mark That's very nice and then Brent put that up

Cold beer that promise of a cold beer is gonna get me through I gotta tell you that the fact stayed surprisingly silent from Kevin Bloody Wilson. Wow. Pfft, speaks volumes, doesn't it? As for food, dieticians decided on what they could and couldn't eat to keep them healthy underground. Todd, who is a hunter, remembered that there were some homemade venison sausages in the fridge at home and he requested some of them along with his mother's homemade relish.

All right. He was told he couldn't have them, and he joked that he'd be pretty pissed if someone else at home made them. That's what I mean, when I get back. But the dieticians were like, no, it's not the right kind of, like, protein for you right now. Yeah, right. Todd also joked that if he didn't start getting what he wanted, he'd have to go on a hunger strike. That's so funny.

Todd's really- They're a good spirit. Yeah, he's lightening it up. Yep. The rescue team eventually negotiated some chips and gravy for the guys. They were really keen on that. That sounds great. But they sent the chips down first and they were so well received that when the gravy

arrived a few minutes later in the next drink bottle, the chips were all gone. They were left there dipping their fingers in gravy. Did they not know the gravy was coming or they just couldn't help themselves? They described themselves as being like seagulls, being like, just gonna have a bloody chip. Hot chips. Hot chips, yeah. Yes.

And they also loved lemonade icey balls, I hear they went down. Yeah. Oh, they would do, yeah. Yeah. They were bloody popular. Especially when it's hot down there. That's refreshing. That is Chuckus a splice. That's nice. Yeah I love a splice. I love a splice Delicious, I'm trying not to think about what they're sending back in these Mount Franklin bottles Can't be a pretty picture. Yeah true

apart from the pissing in the helmet, I'm not sure what was going on. Let him go into that detail. I think- I didn't find that information anywhere and I was googling. I think there's a, this is a vague memory, so apologies if I'm wrong here, but I think they, there were things that they both agreed to never speak about. Yeah. In interviews or anything like that.

And that might've been one of them, I think. Yeah. Now that's fair. As I mentioned, where we shat. Yeah, and they've been very like stringent on that. And fair enough, because that would be quite traumatic for them as well. Yeah, for sure. And we laugh about it now, but you know, it would be bloody awful. Yeah.

And to have that conversation too about, hey, we've been here for six days. We've got to talk about this. Okay, I'm a pretty regular guy. I get quite a bit of fiber, okay? I'm a twice a day kind of guy. I love muesli. All right? So we're gonna have to come to some sort of agreement. No, that's why the dieticians were like,

you can't have venison sausages. Yeah, come on mate. That's gonna be rank. That's gonna go straight through you. I'm looking after Brayton here. They're doing that thing that they're rumoured to do on planes where they're like sneaking emodium into their food. Yes, yeah, yeah.

Emodium? Anti-diarrhea stuff. Oh, right. There's stories about like, you know, that apparently they do that on planes. Kind of clogs you up. To clog people up. So they keep out the toilet. It's fair. It's fair. Keep them out of the toilet.

Can't clog me. Good luck. Love to see you try. Like clockwork. I've had 14 of your passes and I feel fucking great. Now, excuse me, I need to get out to the bathroom. I say that as I board a plane, I make eye contact with the pilot and I say, you cannot

clog me. You cannot clog me. You cannot, you will not clog me. Welcome aboard, ma'am. That's a ROV-42B. So that's them underground. Of course, the rescue effort's going 24-7. It was decided to use a raise borer, which is like a boring tunnel machine, to cut a

horizontal tunnel, one metre or three by three feet in diameter. Cutting horizontal with this machine had never been attempted before anywhere in the world. Perfect. Now's the time. Let's try. But it, I think it cuts a hole, but also it's wide. You know how they're able to pretty easily do the, the one for the tube to go up so they can, but that's only small enough for a drink bottle to go through.

I think they need like a proper one meter square. Yeah. I'm picturing what they use to, to bore tunnels for trains. Like, you know, they're building a new Metro in Melbourne at the moment. Like those sort of like tunnel boring machines, like a mini version of that, I guess. Yeah, totally. And again, these aren't small men.

And they haven't been done horizontally. So what? It's been used to drill down into the ground. Usually that this thing, apparently, is going down. Going down. You want to get deep. Yeah, right. OK.

Yeah. I wonder, I wonder. Yeah, I don't see why it wouldn't be able to go sideways, but all right. Yeah, I think that's what I'm thinking too. They're like, OK, let's give it a crack. Let's give it a go. Give it a go. The plan was to bore horizontally from 930 meters. So five meters below them.

Come and then come up underneath the guys and extract them from below. Yeah. Because surely the biggest risk is messing with whatever's on top of them and causing that to crush down more. Yeah. Because they're on the ground they're on. That's solid. Yeah. Okay. Because, you know, they've driven in on that, but the walls and the roof, that's like rubble.

Yeah. So you don't want to disturb that. So we'll go on below, go through the, what's the floor, then the roof for us and we'll bring them down. Cool. This sounds smart, I reckon. I'm on board for this. I'm always picturing like tunnels that you can only just fit in.

So then I'm like, okay, they've come up behind underneath them. How do you, how do you maneuver? Yeah. How do you get, is it like a slide, but then do you get stuck at some point? I don't want to think about it. Oh yeah. That's scary stuff. Yeah. It was painstaking and constantly the guys were told they'd be out in about 48 hours.

Wow. But this 48 hours just kept ballooning out. I mean, even 48 hours is a long one. I know. If you got told that, I'd be like, holy shit. Oh, settle in, you know? But I think that was also a psychology thing to be like, it's only 48 hours. And then 48 hours would go and they go, guys, it's only gonna be another 48 hours.

Yeah. And that just kept ballooning out. According to the Bickensfield mine manager, Matthew Gill, the quartz rock, which was drilled through, was five times harder than concrete. Yeah, quartz is, that's one of the hard ones. So it's, you have been in a mine. This guy, I'm so sorry. I don't know much.

Uh, harder than diamonds? Couldn't be. Couldn't be. You know, this week I've, I've been drilling through concrete. This is something I've never done before in my life. What for? To put in, um, yeah, it's just, it's just as fun. Uh, no, I've been doing it for, in some more like security cameras around the building so nobody break

into stupid old studios. Yeah, that's right. We got concrete. And crooks. We're secure. We got cameras. I just needed to run a cable through the concrete wall. I needed to drill through concrete and it's hard. Were you just using like a, like a small, how thick was it? Small drill piece? So I was, I started off using like our regular drill that we had. And I was just like, I'll just get like a bloody cement, like a concrete drill bit. Yeah. Um, and drill through and it's not, you just can't do it.

So I had to go out and buy a hammer drill and, um, and like a proper, like, um, you know, uh, yeah, like a proper, yeah, like a hammer drill and like a proper like, you know, yeah, like a proper, yeah, like a hammer drill and then you can get proper drill bits that are much bigger and. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah. And then you put your whole weight behind it. Well, apparently you're not supposed to. Oh, right.

This is what I was reading the guide. You let it do the work, but it, cause it's, I guess like hammering and drilling at the same time. Yeah, right. Maybe don't want to slip with that thing. You're like leaning on it. It's amazing how much of a difference it makes though. Like what was taking me like several minutes and I ran out of battery trying to do it

like with a regular drill. You get the proper gear and it's just like out through. I used it for like five seconds. I'm like, well, that's the job done. I spent like one hundred dollars on a hammer drill. I'm like, well, that's. Can you return that? No, I'm addicted to it now.

I can drill anything now. You're just walking up to concrete and just having it go. Yeah. I mean, I probably shouldn't be doing that. We don't own this building. But it's, yeah, it feels so empowered now. Yeah, you feel powerful. I can put anything anywhere.

And it's satisfying when you get it, like you get DIY done. I've done very little, but you know, even when I paint or something, I'm like, I did that. I actually did something. I used to have to pay someone else to do this. I used to have to pay someone with all the proper gear and all the proper bloody, you know, the, the, the, the ear, ear muffs and the eye goggles. Yeah. It turns out you don't need any of that. You can just do it yourself. It's crazy. I haven't just did it shirtless with thongs on.

I've just Googled it and diamonds are harder than concrete, but again, it's the AI overview, so that could be wrong. No, I reckon they are because sometimes they have concrete tipped drills. I never, I had never had any doubt that diamond was harder than concrete personally. And then, yeah, because you used, is that one of the like practical uses of diamonds because it's the hardest substance that you can. Yeah. That's why you get like diamond tipped drill bits and that sort of thing. And they can like drill through a safe or something.

Yeah, yeah. But so what is, but diamonds harder than quartz? Do you know if- Let's find it. Well, then I had to change it to is moissanite harder than concrete. Moissanite? Yeah, my ring is moissanite, not a diamond. And I wanted to know if this was tough. And it is also harder than concrete. But is it harder than diamond? No. Okay. It's just under diamond. Diamond's got to be the one of, is it the hardest substance? I think so.

Maybe. Well, there you go. Probably the hardest natural substance. Yes, it'd be one of those. Is diamond harder than quartz? Quartz? Yes. In terms of the Mohs, Mohs hardness scale.

I was going to say there's got to be some scale for this. Mohs, Mohs, I can't remember how you say it. Diamond is actually 16 times harder than quartz. Good Lord. Well, lucky they're not stuck in a diamond mine. And quartz is five times stronger, thicker than concrete. So 16 is times five. Oh my God.

It's a lot going on. This is 80 times. Yeah. Diamond is 80 times. Diamond is very hard. Oh my god. Oh, it's a lot going on. This is 80 times. Yeah. Diamond is 80 times. Diamond's very hard. While on the concrete. I wonder if they're using diamond tipped tools to cut through this quartz. Yeah. Um. Yeah, maybe they were. I'm not sure what the, yeah, what the drill they're using is made of. But the drill was capable of drilling through at one meter per hour. Okay. Okay. But it was going much more slowly because of the danger of further rock falls. They had to back it off a bit.

They only did about half a meter per hour and they drilled for something like 90 hours straight. So, okay, so they're quite far away from the men, I suppose. From the edge of 930, yeah. Yeah, okay. Cause they've gone down. They've gone down and they're drilling all the way across underneath them.

And then they're going up. Oh yeah, shit, okay, gotcha. Yeah, yeah. And on the 7th of May, the rescuers reached a belt of hard rock that they found difficult to penetrate. As the jackhammers they were using had little effect, they decided that they were going to have to revert to using low impact charges. That is, little explosives.

Explosives, fuck. Todd and Brant were told of the plan and were not happy about having, quote, explosions under their arse. Yeah. Especially Todd being the explosion guy. Yeah, they'd know about this shit, right? He's like, what the fuck? But after having the process explained to them and being reassured that it was low

impact, they agreed, but only if they could count down the explosions themselves so they could brace for impact. Yeah. Oh, that's smart. Yeah. So they agreed to it 20 minutes later, the charge was ready and Todd, being the explosions guy, counted down on the phone. Three, two, one, fire.

And they both braced. And there was a tiny explosion. He said, fuck my shotgun's got more energy than that. But the rescuers freaked out because they had a live camera watching the guys at this point. All right. And dust filled the screen. And for a second, they thought that they'd just killed them. Jesus.

And they were on the phone being like, are you all right? Are you all right? And like, yeah, guys, we're fine. Bit dusty, but it's all right. That was weak as piss. It would be so stressful. Yeah. Did you say 9th of May?

Yeah. And so, and when did it start? So this is the 7th of May, this explosion. Oh, sorry. On the 25th of April. Anzac Day. Wow. It's a long time.

So it's been 12 days. Oh, man. Evan. Evan. It's fucked. It's been 12 days. 12 days. I guess at least they got, I don't know, sandwiches now.

Yeah, they're getting food now. You don't want to come out now, you've got fresh trackies in a bucket full of gravy. You're okay. Yeah. This is blood livin'. Yeah. I just keep thinking of that over time, man. Yeah, yeah, that's true.

Hey, I haven't clocked off, I'm being paid for this. So they needed more explosions and all in all, they counted down 79 detonations. Oh my god. And just thinking like every each one of them could have been like. Yeah, they have to brace every time and each time underneath them, a guy has to like rig it up. Yeah. Get out of there, say, you ready?

Ready. Three, two, one, explosion. Wait, get up there, rig another one. So this is also takes hours. Yeah. Not getting any sleep through that. No, no way. Finally, after 14 nights. Wow.

So they were there for two weeks lying down. At 4.27am rescuers Glenn Burns, Donovan Lightfoot, what a great name. My god. And Royce Gill finally reached the man, one of them yelling out, I can see your light. And when he broke through the ground, which was separating him from the miners, the miner replied, I can see your light too. Oh man. I can see your light buddy.

It's too much. They could like, starts at like a tiny little pinprick. Over the next 45 minutes, the hole got bigger and bigger until it was big enough to get the man out. Wow. All in all, they'd been underground for 14 days, 321 hours or 1.5 million minutes. Okay. Too far, Dave.

Too far. Someone had done the maths as well. Yeah. 14 days. Yeah. That's too many days. It's a lot. Too full of weeks.

Yeah. Honestly, two weeks of a holiday, I'm getting bored. You know? Yeah. Two weeks of this. It's a lot. Two full weeks. Honestly, two weeks of a holiday I'm getting bored. You know? Two weeks of this. Fuckin' hell. Two weeks? Dave, would you like to be stuck underground with me for two weeks? Who do you reckon would crack first? Me, I'd kill you.

We'd both just die. I'd murder you. Oh my gosh. We'd have a bit of fun though. Yeah, it would be fun. There'd be moments. There'd be funny moments. Yeah.

You're very funny. I gotta take a shit. Uh, we'd have a bit of fun though. Yeah, it would be fun. There'd be moments. There'd be funny moments. Yeah. You're very funny. I'd say, I've got to take a shit. Jess, I have to shit. And I'd say, Dave, I already have. I've done like four.

Whatever. Yeah. Only now you have to shit? Top 10's regular. I'm very regular. You cannot clog me. Thinking about that, I feel like on the one hand, maybe it's better that they didn't know each other. True.

Like if they're real close mates, it'd be hard. The thing, because when I'm like, you know, around like friends and family, I can really be myself, but like in public or whatever, I'm always like overly polite. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I don't want to like cause a scene or whatever. So I'd be there, be like, I'm happy, I'm always like overly polite. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I don't want to like cause a scene or whatever. So I'd be there, be like, I'm happy, no, I'm fine, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My leg's broken, but it's no big deal.

I'd stay with my wife, I'd be like, what the fuck? Yeah. I'm freaking out here, I'm freaking out. You're seeing the real me. But with a stranger, I'd be like, anyway, no, I'm fine, you okay? No, I'm not hungry, I'm good. I'm fine, you can finish the rest of that music.

It's all good. Yeah, I think- Too polite. I think I would prefer to be with somebody I know. Yeah. Yeah. I think so. Um, because then, yeah, I would just let loose. You can be yourself.

You can just relax. You can be your awful self. Dave's Dave's gotten as close as anyone outside of my immediate family has gotten to the real me. Yeah. Yeah. So, and it was awful. Can you put that away?

This is a professional relationship. Can you please bring it back up, please? I'd love a fake smile. I asked how you were. I didn't expect a real answer. I don't want to know. Oh man. So they broke through when they got to them.

So Brant went out first, leaving Todd all alone for eight minutes, which he said was the longest eight of the ordeal, but surely someone would have waited with him. Yeah. So, Brant went out first, leaving Todd all alone for eight minutes, which he said was the longest eight of the ordeal, but surely someone would have waited with him. Yeah. Right? Don't leave him there alone. That's scary. Maybe, but maybe there wasn't room.

There's three rescuers. I think that maybe they all have to help. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then it was Todd's turn, and as he left the hole, he reached for his bag of letters, his family had sent, as well as the photo that had got him through. Wow.

Isn't that beautiful? Stop. They were then taken back to the crib room, which is like a portable office, usually like a shipping container size sort of thing, which is 325 meters below the ground. And this is where they started the whole shift. You go down to this first. Oh, yeah. And the injuries were assessed by paramedics and they were given a makeshift shower with

warm water and barrels. The paramedics didn't want them walking out of the mine and even wanted to sedate the men and put them on stretchers. Right. But the men were adamant that they walked into the mine on Anzac Day and they'd be proudly walking out of it now. Right. Okay.

Especially because it was a media circus. Yeah. So there were cameras, it was crazy. They didn't want to be wheeled out and looking, you know, vulnerable or injured or unwell. And maybe also for their own pride, but maybe also for the kids and for their wives and stuff. Yeah. Coming up to be like, we're okay.

Not looking unwell if they're well enough to walk. Yeah Also, just like you've been stuck there for so long. Like, sure. Let me move my legs. Yeah. If you're able, you know, like if you're physically able, I think that'd be all you would want to do, right? Yes. Yeah.

Stretch. But it was eventually agreed that they could use wheelchairs. But when they got in, and they were like, fine, fuck it, whatever. But when they got into the lift to go back up to the surface, it was only big enough for Todd and Brandt in their wheelchairs. So as soon as the gate closed, they stood up and stacked them in the corner. Which is so good. So good. They were like, fuck this.

Yeah. And when they got to the surface, they emerged back wearing a new set of mining gear. They'd been given brand new work gear. OK. And they were pumped up purely by adrenaline. They walked out with their arms above their heads and you can do this footage of this online. Obviously, about 5,000 cameras captured this moment.

They walked over to the mine. First thing they do, they walk out, arms up, they walk over to the mine board where everyone checks in for work and they mark their name tags as safe. You take it off one board and put it on another so everyone knows who's underground. Yeah. They're safe. They were then embraced by their families. That's my favourite bit.

When they moved the tags. Yeah. They discussed doing it and they did it and it's a really cool moment. Yeah. Watch it back. It's cool. It's really nice. Very symbolic.

And then the families rush over and they have a beautiful moment. But this was not a private reunion. After two ambulances had been called to the mine, word had gotten out and what felt like the whole town had gathered to cheer them on. And they weren't the only ones waiting for the two men. They were told that there was some media interest before getting out, but they did not expect the extent of what they saw. Hundreds of journalists arrived in town to cover the story, transforming Beaconsfield

into a busy town. I mean, it's pretty big news if, I mean, you said two ambulances. If the two ambulances in Tasmania are both called, it's pretty big news. Yeah, good luck having a car accident at that time. Sorry, we're busy. I'm having a heart attack. Sorry. When they got out, they saw dozens of Winnebago and broadcast trucks and they were like, holy

shit. They had walked in two regular miners and it worked, walked out like world famous and in Australia like, like Jess remembers their names 18 years later. Yeah. 19 years later. I'd recognise them in the street. Really? I reckon. Wow. Yeah. It's been a while. They probably look a bit different. Both were then transported to Launceston General Hospital just after 6am local time, this is May 9 now. Todd had an injured knee and a damaged vertebra which put pressure on his sciatic nerve while

Bran had injuries to both knees, several vertebrae and his neck. So they both had some, you know, they weren't 100% by any stretch. Of course, long, yeah, those are long term issues. Yeah. Of course. Long, yeah, those are long term issues. Yeah. They said the lowest point of being in the mine was on about just after they'd been contacted a few days later, they were told Larry didn't get out. Yeah. All right.

Yeah, of course. So they did tell him why they're under there and that was like, they were really upset by that. The family of their friend Larry Knight, who had tragically died in the collapse, had postponed his funeral in the hopes that his colleagues would be rescued and be able to make it. Stop it! And incredibly, they scheduled it for that day, less than six hours after leaving the mine, both Brent and Todd were able to attend.

Fuck! And pay their respects. That's so nice. Absolutely crazy. And again, like, it's sort of that same stoicism of, no, we'll walk out. I don't think much would have stopped them from going, even if the doctors in the hospital were like, you really shouldn't, they'd be like, no, we're going. We have to go.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Wow. I didn't know that. That's nice. Afterwards, the media didn't abate and there was a bidding war to be the first network to interview them. Of course.

In the end, the Nine Network, Channel Nine be the first network to interview them. Of course. Yeah. In the end, the Nine Network, General Nine secured a deal for two point six million dollars. Wow. Each? I think they split that. Wow. Uh, for a two hour special on the night of Sunday the 21st of May called The Great Escape. And there was outrage at the time and there were a couple of articles I found from the

time written about this, that the men had to pay tax on their earnings. They were like, it's un-Australian. They should keep it all after what the boys had been through. Australia is a funny place. We love rules, but also, oh my gosh, nah, that's not on. That's very funny. The men were in demand. It was a big adjustment for these two, That's very funny. The men were in demand. It was a big adjustment for these two, like normal guys with the media following their every move and paparazzi literally appearing at their homes over the first few weeks after the rescue and just taking photos of them in their front yard and stuff.

Yeah, instant celebrities. Leave their families alone. There are at least two interviews with Australia, 60 Minutes that are found online. In October 2006, Dave Grohl from the Food Fighters came through on his word and he and the Food Fighters met Brant Webb and his wife, Rachel. Todd was unfortunately unable to be there, but I think Brant was the big fan. Yeah, right. He also played Brant an instrumental song he had written called Ballad of the

Beaconsfield Miners. Amazing. Grohl later said, after the show, we went and got fucking wasted in the hotel bar. And I was like, dude, I promise I'm going to put this on the record. And he came through on that promise too. It was included on the 2007 Foo Fighters album, Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace, which won the Grammy award for best rock album. Oh, wow.

But it's just like a couple of acoustic guitars. I later heard that he played it to Brant and Brant was like, man, it was so cool. But like, can you just imagine just a guy, you're in their dressing room and he's just playing you an acoustic like instrumental song. This one's about you. I knew that he had written this. I knew that there was a song called Ballad of the Beaconsfield Minders. I remember that. But I this. I knew that there was this encore ballad of the Beaconsfield Minders. I remember that. But I didn't know that it was instrumental.

Yeah. I just never heard it. The lyrics are about that. It's just so funny. It's just guitar. I'm just playing it to him, sort of making weird eye contact. Have you heard, have you listened to it? Is it a good track? Yeah. I mean, yeah. It's like sort of two dueling acoustic guitars. So yeah, it's cool. Yeah. Okay. It, um, it doesn't, it doesn't have the signature Foo Fighters sound, I guess, because he's not singing and it's not rock. Yep.

Yep. But yeah, it's a nice little song. That's nice. That's a little ditty. Huh. Uh, then there was the novelty song, 3, 2, 1, which wasn't really a novelty. It was just recorded with it by the Adelaide band called Unitopia. Todd Brandt and their wives contributed backing vocals to the song that

commemorates how many hours they spent underground. Wow. That's also on Spotify. Three, two, one by Unitopia. That definitely has some very literal lyrics. Like, they were trapped on the ground. Their names were Brand on the ground. The names were Brandon. Not far off.

Then of course there was the tele movie. Yes. Also for the nine network, Shane Jacobson, Shane Jacobson, and brand web and lucky Hume as Todd Russell premiering in 2012. It was a ratings hit. Like the peak of Australian cast. Like you wouldn't really get better than that. Two big guys.

At that time, Shane and Lockie were, yeah. Oh, big. And it was a ratings hit. An audience of over 1.6 million. Yeah. Wow, you'd kill for that these days. I know, you couldn't even dream of that. I think, don't even think it's state of origin.

Do we need another tragedy, do you reckon? No, we'll just go straight to Stan now. Wasn't there a barley bombing thing on Stan? Oh, there was, wasn't there? Yes, a dramatization, yeah. Yeah, I don't need to watch that, thanks. In 2008, comedian, friend of the show and now host of the Irrational Fear podcast, Dan Illich premiered Beaconsfield the Musical, the Melbourne Fringe Festival.

This is what I thought about when you mentioned, for some reason the only thing I know. All right. When you mentioned the Beaconsfield minor. You've been around comedy too long, Evan. Yeah, yeah. I forgot about that. That does ring a bell. It was originally titled Beaconsfield, a musical in A flat minor.

Which is a pretty good wordplay. That's pretty good, but I didn't realise someone died. And that obviously you can't. Yes, so there was backlash from the family of Flarey. If everyone lived, if nobody died, you could get away with it, but you can't. Yeah. So there was backlash at the time and the ABC wrote an article which I found saying Elyt reportedly made the change out of respect to just Beegansville the musical.

Had a great cast, so it starred Elyt himself, Kate MacLennan, Robbie McGregor, Toby Truslove and Amanda Buckley. Yeah, wow. Also went to the Melbourne Comedy Festival the year after. So that was what, 2008? 2008 for Melbourne Fringe, 2009 for Melbourne Comedy Festival. A couple of years later. Yeah.

But you got to draw that line of like, yeah, it still has to be relevant and in people's memories. But, you know. So the thing about the show was, which I didn't see at the time, I hadn't started seeing many shows at that point yet, but I read a review of it saying it was less about making fun of them. It was actually more, it took the piss out of the crazy media response. Yeah. Yeah.

That was like the media hype at the time. So that is what they were. Yeah, good. Parodying rather than the plight. Yes. According to this review anyway. I mean, I can only imagine like the Today Show, Sunrise, all of these for two weeks. Yeah.

Being, you know, there's not much to talk about. We've got hours of airtime to film. We have an exclusive interview with Todd's dentist. Yeah. I honestly think it was like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's terrific. Can I imagine that the families would be harassed from day one?

Absolutely. Like the wife and kids and stuff would be just like, I don't know if they were doing, I presume they weren't doing interviews with the family. Like I imagine they weren't talking to the like, I don't know if they were doing, I presume they weren't doing interviews with the family. Like I imagine they weren't talking to the media. I don't know, maybe they were. Yeah, yeah, maybe. But yeah, they'd be hounded. Yeah, horrific. It was, it was- They're young kids too, like it's awful. And you just like, yeah, the poor producers who have to come up with content- I know.... around all of this for just days and days and days and you don't know when

it's going to end or how it's going to end. Yeah. It would be, yeah, there would be, there's plenty there to take the piss out of. Yeah, yeah. So I think that's more what they were going for. But of course there's headlines probably from the similar media people being like, outrage. There's a comedy musical making fun of the miners. It's like, ah, actually, we're making fun of you.

Yeah. It's not the miners. A flat miner though is pretty funny. It's a, oh, actually, we're making fun of you. Yeah. It's not the miners. A flat miner though is pretty funny. It's a good joke. Oh, it's very funny. But yeah, when you go, no, someone died. And it was only a couple of years ago. Yeah, I can see.

I can see both sides. When you think about it, it's a real shame that someone died. So they couldn't do that joke. Yeah. That's the real tragedy here. Because it's a great way to play. It really is. From our perspective as comedy creators, that's the real tragedy.

Long term it should be noted that Todd Russell especially has been very open about suffering PTSD and depression since being rescued and he's had a lot of help from psychologists. You can hear the story and his personal struggles and his own words on the ABC podcast, I Was Actually There, where he was recently interviewed on the ABC podcast, I was actually there, where he was recently interviewed on the Nova podcast, Head Game as well. So you'll notice that there's lots of other articles that I've referenced as well than there in the show notes, but that's probably more why I say more from Todd's perspective than Brant.

He seems to have done less media over the years since. Yep. That's Brant. So Todd did, I was actually there, but Brant didn't. No. Yeah, right. They shot that show here. Oh, really?

Yeah. I love it. Maybe not the episode. For the same guys, too, you can't ask that. And so it's like the set is just a backdrop that they can set up anywhere. So for Melbourne ones, they shot here in a studio. Awesome.

But I'm not sure which episode. Yeah, so there's the TV show, and then they also added that long, because they obviously interviewed him for our studio. Awesome. But I'm not sure if, I'm not sure which episode. Ah, yes, so I believe, so there's the TV show and then they also added that long, because they obviously interviewed him for many hours. Yep. They've cut together this podcast. It's like, it's like in his own words. Yeah, yeah. No interview questions.

It's just, so that's fascinating. Yeah, interesting. Yeah, I should listen to that. So yeah, that's, that's definitely a great listener. I assume they didn't work again. They, they're getting like more than, more than a million dollars out of these like interview deals and stuff that would never have to work again. Surely there's got to be like a work cover thing involved.

Yeah. Well, I mean. I feel like, did they go back to work? I think that they didn't, definitely didn't go back mining. Yeah. One of them in the years after had been back down once since. But in one of the 60 minutes interviews, Brandant was like, they take them back to the top of the mine and they're having a chat to them. And he goes, even standing here,

I feel uneasy. Yeah, fair enough. And I'm like, yeah, I totally get that. But then there's a few kind of gross articles I didn't want to, like from like the Daily Mail about like, what are they up to now? And it's like, Brant's like, he's working four jobs, he's delivering food, he's doing all this sort of stuff. But I, you know, you never want to, you never know if they're actually telling the truth. But I believe that they've both done a bit of motivational speaking and they're in, and

they've also written a book as well with another writer. So I thought I had heard probably slightly more recently that they aren't really talking to each other. There was another article about on the DailyMailNews.com.au that said- Oh, Daily Mail, don't worry about it. That it said like, they're no longer mates or something because there was like a 10 year anniversary like celebration slash dinner and drinks kind of thing. And it said, they arrived separately and it was all these things. And I was like trying to read between the lines, like, are slash dinner and drinks kind of thing. And it said they arrived separately.

And it was all these things. And I was like trying to read between the lines, like, are they actually not talking or are they just? They don't live together. Yeah. Why would they arrive together? And also, they weren't friends beforehand. Yeah.

But they both lived, they both spent their, the money they, they, they made, like they were paid for the interview. At the time, they both built houses in the area, they didn't move away. They were both like, they bought a bit of land outside of Beaconsfield, but they both stayed local. Yeah. Yeah, right. At the time anyway, but you know, obviously it's nearly 20 years now, so.

They don't have to live in each other's pockets forever. Yeah. But they've shared something hugely traumatic and yeah, there'd be a bond over that, but they don't have to be best friends. And they give each other a lot of credit for getting through it. Yeah. Because of they had each other. But also imagine like, yeah, okay.

You've got very understandably PTSD and a lot of trauma around being in such a horrific setting. There could be comfort in each other, but also probably a bit of a reminder. Oh, of course. Yeah. The only association you have with that person is that horrible traumatic experience, the worst experience of your life. It's probably also fine to be like, love you, mate.

So glad you're okay. Do need some space. Your face is actually very triggering for me. Like that's fair enough. Yeah. But yeah, that's why I was like, Oh, I thought I'd heard they weren't talking. But then you go, it's a daily male thing. You go, Oh, don't worry about it.

It's bullshit. Yeah. I couldn't. Yeah. Cause I was, you know, two hours, I was fascinated to know what their relationship was like, but yeah, it was hard to, to see what it's actually like. Exactly. Uh, the whole affair also put future politician at the time and almost prime minister of Australia, Bill Shorten on the national stage.

Oh. He was national secretary of the Australian workers Union at the time, and he played a role as a negotiator and commentator on developments in the immediate aftermath and the ensuing rescue operations. And he had a real rise in profile in the media during this time, was doing lots of interviews, is out there every day talking to the media. And he was elected to parliament the year later after this rise in profile 2007 and he only retired a few months ago. So there you go.

Really changed his trajectory. Yeah. Just finally, after an inquest in 2009, the Tasmanian coroner, Rod Chandler, ruled that no one person or company was responsible for the death of Larry Knight in the Anzac Day Rockfall. But he says there were quote, serious deficiencies in the miners risk management and quote, in the lead up to the collapse, the mine itself closed in 2012, which is a big reason that the population's gone from three and a half

thousand to less than 1500 now. But there is a museum and cultural center there that still gets 44,000 visitors a year. Wow. And I believe part of it is about this story, but also the 150 years mining history in the region. There's a museum and cultural centre there that still gets 44,000 visitors a year. Wow. And I believe part of it is about this story, but also the 150 years mining history in the region. Yeah, yeah.

Going back to that original gold rush. So you still can go there. Wow. And every now and then, apparently, this is still also years ago, Todd Russell might be there to give a talk. Wow. But yeah, that also might've just been for the 60 minutes interview that I said that. Yeah.

Right. Ah, that's interesting. I mean, of course, I mean, of course I wouldn't think that someone would be responsible. It's an earthquake, you know? Yeah. And, you know, unless they're negligent in their safety and stuff, it's like, what can you do? It's an earthquake. Yes, there was something about like the type of, I don't know, I they're negligent in their safety and stuff, it's like, what can you do? It's an earthquake.

Yes, there was something about like the type of, I don't know, I don't want to say too much because I don't want to get any company in trouble, but about maybe the type of mesh they were using for reinforcing something was kind of the question. But yeah, or I'm not sure technically, but there were some question marks over some procedures, but you can find, if you want to look it up, Evan, the coroner's findings online, but it was hundreds of pages long. Yeah. If you want to go into that, Evan, you are welcome to.

I mean, I, no, I'm not going to be delving deep into that one. I'm not going to be mining that document for- Oh, God, Evan, stop it. Wow. Stop it. Stop it at once. So after me going through all that, did any of that like jog your memory at all, Evan? Like off the time? No, I just, I just wasn't following it at the time.

I didn't unearth any, sorry, I'm going to stop trying to. I'm so mad at you. No, you had me all along. I didn't know anything about this, really. Fascinating. Yeah, I just knew sort of the headline stuff. And like I said, I didn't know that they were basically lying down. Like, it's just so scary.

Yeah, it must have been horrible. I really want to go and look at some of the stuff now, like the interviews or try and find- What would you recommend? Oh man. Is there someone to look at? I'm going to bring up them coming out of the mine. Yeah, watching the video of them coming out. That's an awesome video.

That's what I thought I might cry. And the podcast version of I Was Actually There is a great listen, yeah. Yeah, cool. Really brings it home. So were they down the grub? Yeah, did you just bring that up? Cause you wanted to say it. I didn't know which, which shaft they were down.

I'm not sure it was the grub or the heart or the main. My favorite is definitely the grub. Um, wild, terrifying. Yeah. Awful. Um, yeah, I wouldn't want to be a miner. It's a tough job. Yeah.

It's, uh, it's, it's, it doesn't seem fun. No, I wouldn't, I wouldn't enjoy it. I think one side effect was like happy side effects is that it did really improve safety. Yeah. Yeah. Anything like that. It's like, well, there's always a review. Yeah. It gets better for future people. Yeah. But it shouldn't take something like this. Yeah. Anything like that. It's like, well. There's always a review.

Yeah. It gets better for future people. Yeah. But it shouldn't take something like this to make that happen. But it tends to. Wow. What a story. Well, thanks so much for joining us.

Thank you so much. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I found it. I'm sorry. I'm watching the thing. All right. That's them walking out, arms over their heads, waving straight over to move their tags over. They walk, like he's walking pretty well for somebody who's, and then the wives come in,

but they're both moving pretty well for people with back and knee injuries. Yeah, that's right. Oh man. That feeling must have just been, it'd just be the most incredible feeling in the world. That's gotta be the freshest air you've ever smelled. Yeah. You'd be going out for dinner somewhere. Oh, apparently this is another fun thing he says in the ABC podcast is that media are

handing them everywhere and Todd Russell, he wanted a bit of alone time with his mates and to thank people that are rescuing him, whatever. So he said, he yells out to one of the with his mates and to thank people that had rescued him or whatever. So he said, he yells out to one of the media trucks, hi, I'm Todd Russell, I'm going to do an interview in 25 minutes down at any names or location. Everyone goes there and he snuck in the back room of a different pub. Oh, that's so good. That's good, I like that.

You know, with the people that had like risked their lives to save him. Yeah. A lot of them, that's another part of it, is a lot of them are the people he knows because they're like the local mining experts and he's worked with them. Yeah, yeah. They've all worked together. Those are your mates. Which is like, yeah, imagine obviously it's the worst for them, right?

And their family's obviously the worst, but two weeks of going to work to do these rescue missions or going to work knowing that two of your mates are stuck. Once they realize they're alive and they're so happy, but then it's still so tricky. It would be so incredibly emotionally draining for their friends and their coworkers. And you would know more than anyone else in the world how dangerous it is. Yes. The likely scenarios, what's the outcomes. And in those first four days, they've probably been assuming their friends are dead.

Then you find out they're alive and you'd be so happy, but then you're living in fear that they're going to die. Yes. And your actions. Yes. Exactly. If you do the wrong thing, you blow the wrong thing up, you drill the wrong thing. Even when you find them alive, it's like the chances that they're going to come out of

this alive is just so slim. It really is like an incredible survival story. Yeah. It's amazing. It's against all odds for sure. It's so slim. It really is like an incredible survival story. It's amazing. It's against all odds for sure. Yeah. Great story. Cool stuff. Evan, thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you so much for letting me sit here for that story. That was so cool. And if we want to hear more from you, we want to see more of you. I'm sure people do. I'd love to see more of Evan. See more of Evan. Hosting up a storm on Gamey gamey game. Yeah. Yeah. It's a bit of an irregular release schedule at the moment that there's a lot of

episodes up there. Um, and you've both been on. Yep. Yes. That's right. A lot of fun to you that you do like video game stuff. Yeah. We don't take things too seriously over there. Um, yeah, it's ostensibly a show about video games, but it's a, it's really just a silly comedy chat show. So if you want to go check that out, it's on YouTube, stupid old channel. There is a podcast version as well. If you're, if you're not into looking at things, uh, you can, you can just listen.

I have to say one of the hardest laughs I've had recently was a clip from gamey gamey game of you talking about how you think you could be an optometrist. I didn't say that. It's, uh, I laughed so hard the whole way through. Cause I was like, I understand what he's saying and it's insane. Yeah. It's great. It's true.

I know. I get it. I genuinely do understand, but then just hearing everybody else lose their minds, hearing Ben- They don't think I could be. No, I don't think so either. They doubt you. They doubt your ability to be an optometrist. I mean, what, you know, you've got your charts. No, I don't think so either. They doubt you. They doubt your ability to be an optometrist.

I mean, what, you know, you got your charts. Yeah. Get people to read the charts. Oh, let's not get him riled up again. You look at the charts, how hard is it? How hard could it be to be an optometrist? Better or worse? One or two.

There you go, done. Yeah. One or two. Recently I got my eyes tested and they said my eyesight has improved. All right. I don't need to wear glasses anymore. And I was like, are you an optometrist?

Are they just getting lazy? What are you talking about? That was me. I'm sorry. Everyone was like, I don't know how to build glasses. You just tell everyone. You're fine. You don't need these.

No, your eyes are great. Maybe they were confused and they were an optimist. God, he's good. He's that good. He's that good. He's that good. Evan Ronner-Smith. Thank you so much. Thanks so much for having me guys.

And as we say goodbye to Evan, we say hello to you. The listeners, I get, I'm assuming you've jumped ahead to just start listening right here. Yes. Welcome. Welcome to everyone's favorite section of the show where we like to spend a little bit of time, you know, giving credit where it's due. Yes.

Can I say that? Yeah, I think you can. Because this podcast would not exist without you, the listeners, and our wonderful Patreons, people who support us at patreon.com slash do go on pod and get a whole bunch of rewards for different levels. Dave, what kind of stuff can they get? Well, the big one is, uh, the new one actually, ad-free listening. True.

That's absolutely one of the key ones. Also, four bonus episodes a month. We put out one nearly every week, unless it's five Sundays. But we put out... Those pesky months. No, no, darn you. We want to put one out every week, but we can't. We can't.

It's actually obligated to not. We can't. We're only doing four. But also putting out, but we can't. We're contractually obligated to not. We can't. We're the number four. But also putting out, we've already put out 250 plus bonus ones in the back catalog. There's literally hundreds of hours to unlock instantly. You can be in the Facebook group, which is a beautiful corner of the internet. You hear about live shows before anyone else.

You get discount tickets. And you also just get the sense of satisfaction knowing that this show is going, and it's going to continue to go, because of you and people like you. Keeping the lights on. That's right. So thank you very much. We have to turn some of them off. Yeah, saving power.

That's right. And so a few things we like to do here. First off, we like to start with the section where people like to give us facts, quotes, questions, brag suggestions, anything. It can, it can be anything. That's right. And, um, uh, this section has a jingle and I believe it goes something like this. Fact quote or question.

Ding. Oh, you always remember the ding. I always remember the sink. I always remember the sink. You said, ding. Yeah. I loved it. Thank you. Never change.

Oh, that's been anything. I'll never not do it. Fantastic. You'll forget. Um, and so yes, people are here. They get to give themselves a title. They can give us a suggestion. Uh, recently we had a promise.

Uh, thank you. Uh, it can be anything. So, um So first up we have Adam Trapchinsky. Adam's given themselves the title future guest on who knew it and do go on. Oh, huge get. But not book cheat. I've said no. Your agent got in contact and I said never. No way.

Adam's given us a suggestion and here it is. Oh, a long one. Okay. Hey guys, hope you're doing well as I have a suggestion on a possible bonus episode. I want to preface that if this was an early bonus episode, I just straight up don't remember as I have the memory of Jess when it comes to this pod. I also want to say that even if this was a previous episode, I want it known that I came up with the idea and if it is used without my likeness, you will hear from my lawyers,

plural. I mean, you won't really, but the threat is on your mind. Anyway, you ever wonder if someone just uses a fact, quote, a question section to waste your time? I sometimes do. I wonder who would do such a thing. You know, writing in and expecting them to get to the point, but they drift off and you can't remember what the original thing they wanted to write in was.

Anyway, long story short, you guys should do reading Reddit stories. I don't read Reddit myself, but I love listening to crazy stories and honestly debating if they're even real and hearing your opinions on various situations. I love the idea of reading stories, but not the type of person to take the time to look for stories to read. Well, I never really know how to sign off of the fact-quota question, but I hope you appreciate my short and precise suggestion of reading Reddit stories. Thank you and go get some Matt and go get some Matt and Jess with each other doesn't

count. What do I mean? I need all the encouragement I can get. with each other doesn't count. What about me? I need all the encouragement I can get. So thank you to Adam. That was a mouthful. That was a journey. Reddit stories, how do you feel about those? You ever on Reddit?

Nah, but I see screenshots of Reddit stories or retellings of them over cooking videos on TikTok a lot. Okay. What's the combination there? Why are they combined? I don't know. People, our attention spans are fucked. And so it's usually a Reddit story over like a Minecraft game or something. Oh, and you watch the video? Well, I must have at some point and now I get them a fair bit in my algorithm.

Okay. So I don't have fair bit in my algorithm. Okay. So I didn't have to go looking on Reddit. They come to me. I don't get you internet. It's a strange place and I'm scared. I'm very frightened. Next fact photo question comes from Kevin West and Kevin West has given themselves the title misplacer of the chill pills.

Uh-oh. Brother Muthu. That's why I'm feeling it. Feeling really anxious. For it's, Kevin has given us a fact quote and question, but not necessarily in that order. That's in parentheses. All right, Kevin.

Okay. So a quote I love by author and poet, Richard Broughtigan is, reduce intelligence and emotional noise until you arrive at the silence of yourself and listen to it. That's nice. Reduce intelligence and emotional noise until you arrive at the silence of yourself and listen to it. I like that.

Kevin goes on, I love this as an idea, but the fact is it's hard to reduce stress and remain in a place of calm, especially as an American in 2025. Should I exercise, meditate, do yoga, pet my furry friend? No, that is not a euphemism, but maybe I should slap on a dinger and have an awkward tumble with my partner of 20 years. Hang on. That sounds like more trouble than it's worth. So in this beautiful sentence. You can remain calm.

Like, you know, you should remain calm trying to find your zen in place. Should I just get a root? Yeah, sure. Just have a bit of, you know, a roll in the hay. Ah, too hard. Yeah, too much effort. I can't be bothered. I'm never gonna shower after that.

So my question is, what do you three do to help reduce stress? Well, you just- It's certainly not that. For me, there is one very unorthodox method that seems to help lately. Put on the headphones, lay down and listen to DoGo on. Thanks for being part of my mindfulness. DoGo Namaste. DoGo Namaste to you.

What do you do to help reduce stress? Mine is- You don't strike me as a very stressed person. I can get stressed when things sort of- I can. No need to be defensive stressed person. I can get stressed with things when things sort of... Okay, no need to be defensive. I can get stressed, okay? No, when things can, I guess, ramp up, you're like, oh, I've got so many things to do, gotta do this. Love having a little walk around the block, fresh air. Yes. Look at the park. Hot girl walks is what you're talking about, yeah. Yeah, love that. Listen to a podcast, try and think about something else.

Listen to an audio book. Listen to some nice music. Um, that's definitely my most, what are you laughing at? What are you laughing at? Just a weird thing popped into my head. That's all. And what is it? Like you're going for a walk and I was like, and I go out and punch Nazis.

That's what popped into my head. And that calms you down? Yeah, it calms me down. Yeah, it settles my nerves. Because that gets me going. No, yeah, I love a little bit of fresh air. How about yourself? To help reduce stress, I have regular appointments with a therapist.

Okay, that's good. And I exercise and I pat my dog and I avoid stress. No, I don't. I can't. I try. It's hard. It's everywhere. It's hard.

It's everywhere. Yeah. It's crazy. Um, yeah, look, there's lots of different things. I've been trying to get a bit more into yoga and Pilates again, but more just because my body is sore. Yeah. Okay.

Sure. You know, and you're doing classes or doing it at home. Yeah. A bit of both. Yep. That know, and you're doing classes or doing it at home. Yeah. A bit of both. Yep. That's, I've had an interesting journey with exercise. It turns out it's been making things worse in terms of migraines. I've been telling that for years.

I know. Exercise, it will kill you. So now I'm starting again. Thank you, Kevin. Thank you, Adam. We really appreciate you so much. Thank you. The next thing we need to do is shout out some of our fantastic listeners. We just,

we play a little game with it and we shout them out. And, and what kind of game could we play? Cause I've just remembered the heaviness of this topic. Yes, that's right. Being trapped underground for, for two weeks. It's a difficult situation. Yeah. Cause obviously my brain goes straight to where are they trapped? Yes. Does that feel poor taste? We could, what band has written them a tribute song? The Foo Fighters wrote that song.

That's great. Should I get band generator? Yes, random band generator. What band were they listening to in a stressful situation and then the bands found out and gone, you know what, I'm going to write you a track. Here's the thing. We were just talking before we started recording about AI and how like full on it's getting and how we're going to be out of a job soon. And I'm like, I hate AI, but here I am.

What the fuck do I think these random list generators are? There was someone just inputted the like, there's 500 bands and it cycles through. Do you reckon? Is it just an Excel spreadsheet with 500 or are they? It's hard to say, who knows. You're right. I know. You're right.

I know. I hadn't thought about the random generators. But here we are. I think the ones where it is combined, when it's coming up with new things, I used to actually, I did assume that it was like when we've got create a wizard name, it's got a combination of three things and it smashes them together, but maybe it is artificial intelligence. Well, nowadays probably.

But anyway, I like that. This is a band that's written them a song during a very stressful situation. They may or may not be trapped somewhere. Yeah, they just needed a track. They've made the news though. Something's happened. Yeah, and now they just needed a track. They've made the news though. Something's happened. Yeah, and now they've got a tribute. Yep. So maybe I'll read the people in their place and you give us the band or the artist that's written the song about them. You got it.

First of all, thank you to, from Barnard Castle in Great Britain. Doesn't that sound beautiful? Beautiful. From Barnard Castle, it's Laura Kennedy. Bruno Mars has written you a ballad. Really? Yeah. And you know that's going to get billions of streams. Exactly. And you're not going to see a cent of that.

He's the number one guy on Spotify. Yeah, you're not going to watch. You're not going to see a cent of that. Yes, exactly. He's taking your trauma. To be honest, Bruno is probably not seeing heaps from streams. No, I don't think so. Even when you have billions.

He's not sharing that with you. Laura Kennedy, Bruno Mars, what a collab. Huge. Yeah, it's huge. What a collab. Huge. Yeah, it's huge. Next up, I'd like to thank from location unknown to us, which means they haven't shared it, but that's okay, because we assume that means they are deep within the fortress of the moles, and that is Nick. Nick getting a big star.

Ariana Grande. Whoa! What a voice. Huge. Huge voice. Huge voice. Tiny. Huge voice. Huge voice. Tiny woman.

Exactly. Where does it come from? It's crazy. It doesn't make any sense. Great work. She must be 90% lungs. Yeah. You know, I don't think there's other organs in there.

There can't be. Just from an anatomical perspective. Can't get in there. She doesn't have a liver. No spleen in there. Don't need it. What a waste of space. It's all lungs.

It's all lungs. She's like a balloon. Nick, N-I-C-K and your last name looks like it starts with an H if you think. Did you just spell Nick? Well, I guess that really, it would have been better if it was just N-I-C, wouldn't it? Then it might have been worth spelling. Yeah. But N-I-C-K is default Nick. I've ruled out maybe 0.5% of Nick's.

You're absolutely right. I copped that. Sorry, I can't. I just can't let you get away with it. I know. I appreciate it. You keep me honest. From Brighton in Great Britain, thank you to Kamaluni. Kamaluni.

Another big one. Are you ready? Another big voice, big celeb, big artist at the moment, tiny person. Sabrina Carpenter. Sabrina Carpenter. Wow. Yeah. This is huge. Massive. Again, Sabrina Carpenter. Sabrina Carpenter, wow. Yeah. This is huge.

Massive, again, all lungs surely, so teeny tiny. Pocket size. And you get these three people, these are people in their prime as well. Yeah. So these new hits coming out, people are gonna hear them. Kamaluni. That's right, this is huge for you. And this one's for you.

I would like to thank from Cleveland in the USA, thank you to Jeremiah, and I don't think it is Cleveland, Ohio either. It's Cleveland in Mississippa. Oh, wow. They have a Cleveland in Mississippa. I love Mississippa. I think I accidentally said it that way and I'm obsessed with saying it like that. Mississippa.

From Bear. From big old Mississippa. Oh my God. Home to the Grammy that. Mississippa. From big old Mississippa. Oh my god, home to the Grammy Museum Mississippa? David, you've gotten distracted. History of the Grammys? You haven't even said the person's name. No, well, they're... This is bigger than you, okay?

This is about Mississippa. Now, from Cleveland, Mississippa, thank you to Jeremiah Smith. Speaking of Grammys, Billy Eilish. That's a truckload. That's a lot. I was thinking you meant grandmas at first. Speaking of grandmas. Yeah, wow.

Billie Eilish. One accomplished singer. Yeah, huge. Now writing about you, Jeremiah Smith. Love it. You have two Academy Awards. I know. Two. I know. Unbelievable.

Bizarre. From Shoreham by Sea in Great Britain. Beautiful standing place as well. Meg. Meg. Spelled M-E-G. Thank you for letting me know. Meg, huge, has been, has had a song written about them by Florence and the Machine. Whoa. One of the best live gigs I've ever seen in my life. Another great voice. Such a great voice. Huge. Poor. The energy in that arena was electric. Love to see them. So good. Would you be standing ovation if they said this one's for Meg? No. Meg's been in the news. I don't like the Meg song. Not my favorite. I love to think that it's also called the Meg.

Meg. It's called the Meg song and everybody else is standing in a vulture, but I'm just standing there sitting down. I've got my purse on my lap. Play the second album. I'm checking my watch. Yawn. No offense to Meg.

I just don't write the song. Fair enough. Thanks Meg. And thank you to Location Unknown to us. We can achieve this business also. Deep within the fortress write the song. Fair enough. Thanks Meg, and thank you to Location Unknown to us. We can issue you this business also. Deep within the fortress of the moles, thank you to Angelina Allen. Angelina Allen has a song written about them by Blake Shelton. Really?

Yeah. Blake Shelton. Blake Shelton. Is that an American Idol guy? Yes. Maybe if he has country, that's what I do know. Yeah. And is he on Idol? I think so.

Maybe it's just a- One of them? Oh, he debuted in 2001. Maybe not. Okay. Maybe it's just one of those American- Oh, no, sorry. No, he's not on, um, he wasn't on American Idol, but I thought he was a,

he's a judge. Oh, sorry. I'm now scrolling down. He's a coach on The Voice. Coach on The Voice. For many seasons. Yeah, there you go. For 12 years. Okay. Married to Gwen Stefani. Oh, okay. That's another reason I know that. Brilliant. Well, Angelina Allen, here's a

new country and western hit hit just for you. A couple of go here. Thank you so much from Edinburgh, one of our favourite cities in the whole wide world. Thank you to Jeremy Hwan. I've been listening to this track a little bit actually. About Jeremy Hwan? Yes, because it was written and recorded by and recorded by Chappell Rhone. Chappell Rhone! Oh my gosh. Huge, huge. This random music artist is, a generator is quite pop heavy. It's really going through, yeah, a lot of...

I'm just choosing the ones that I know and... Some coming up you don't know. Yeah. Okay. Oh yeah, big time. I'm just going to read the next one because these guys have come up multiple times, so I'm just going to read the next one because these guys have come up multiple times, so I'm just going to read it. Okay.

Now, next up from Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. Thank you so much, which I believe is the capital there, to Hanouf Mukbal. And out of Nashville, a duo called Florida Georgia Line. Florida Georgia Line. Florida Georgia Line. Yep. Okay. Who I think broke up. No, but surely they're back together?

I don't know. I've never heard of them. No, for this situation. Yes, they're back together. They're back to write a track for Hanouf Mukbal. For this. There you go. Oh yeah, it looks like they, a couple years ago.

Anyway, they're back. And their new hit is all about Hanouf in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Love it. Thank you so much. Great to have you supporting us. In the last few weeks, there's been a couple of people from Saudi Arabia. We're really starting to crack that Saudi Arabian market. About time.

Thank you, Hanouf. And finally, I would like to thank, bringing it closer to home, from Broadford in Victoria, hello, thank you, to Sarah Hollis. Who has had a track written about them. It's already got awards buzz. Really? Lady Gaga. Oh my gosh.

Wow. Huge. Because what I love about that is you know there's going to be, there's the Sarah Hollis single. There's also the Sarah Hollis dance moves. Exactly right. Come along with that. Yep. Yep.

And an iconic outfit that Gaga is wearing in the video clip. The people will know about. People might say this is, she's in a Sarah Hollis era. Exactly. It's pretty big. It's exciting stuff. Love it. So thank you again to Sarah, Hanouf, Jeremy, Angelina, Meg, Jeremiah, Kamaluni, Nick and Laura.

Well, there's only one thing left to do, JP, and that is check if there's any inductees into this week's Tripp Ditch Club, our theater of the mind clubhouse hall of fame where people that have been supporting the show on the shout out level or above for three consecutive years. Well, we're gonna shout them out one more time by welcoming them into the Hall of Fame.

We high five them as we yell out their name. They go on in and inside there's food, drink, entertainment, places to sleep, places to do whatever else you need to do. Whatever you need to do. Okay. Do your ablution. Yes, we've recently just upgraded. Now we have toilets. We have toilets just upgraded now. We have toilets.

We have toilets and yeah, we took the feedback. People wanted toilets and we said, okay. Wouldn't have thought that, but okay. So there are a few inductees this week. Dave, I am behind the bar as you know. I handle food and drink, which is, no, I think about it quite sexist, that that's my job. Hey. You're literally saying to the woman, get back in the kitchen.

We've tried to wrestle those utensils from your hands and you have honestly given us a couple of black eyes. Well, it's often on theme and this week I've gone a little bit crazy, if I can be honest with you, Dave. I've gone a bit wild. Oh my gosh. What have you got? week, I've gone a little bit crazy, if I can be honest with you, Dave.

I've gone a bit wild. Oh my gosh. What have you got? I went to Costco and I bought a palette of muesli bars. A palette of muesli bars? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, fantastic. Yeah. Which is crazy because you just mentioned before that like the guys, while they were

stuck in a hole, they're like, they've got a muesli bar. And then they were like, all right, we'll eat on day one, day four. Yeah. And then they dropped it. Well, I've got so many muesli bars. So you don't have to ration it. You can just go nuts. Go nuts?

Yeah. Hey, drop it. Who cares? It's a variety pack too. Grab a new one. Grab a new one. I don't give a shit. Gosh.

Any with coconut? No. Chocolate? No. What kind of variety? We got berries? No. What have we got? Plain. A variety pack of plain. Oh hey, enjoy everyone.

And you also book a band Dave. Yes, you're never going to believe it. What? You are never going to believe it. What? Here to perform an entirely acoustic set. They will not be singing, but who cares? He's also got a guitar.

Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters is here. No way. Why won't he sing? Because he's only playing his instrumental tracks. Oh, okay. Like Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners. Gotcha. I'm sure there's others. There's bound to be others. But do you reckon we could sway him a little bit to sing a couple of the classics?

No, he did say he will do some Nirvana songs, but only on the drums. Okay. So there's that bit, it smells like Teen Spirit, the... the classics maybe? No, he did say he will do some Nirvana songs, but only on the drums. Okay. So there's that bit, it smells like Teen Spirit, the that we all know, how it starts. And then from then on, everyone's going to sing along and hope they're up to the right beat. Yeah, and some people have to go, okay. Yeah, that could actually be a bit of fun. That could be quite fun. That could be a bit of fun. All Alright, so we've got three inductees. Matt's usually here to like lift the velvet rope, let people in. I'll do that this week.

Dave, you then hype them up. I will hype you up. It's just going to be a big old hype fest, okay? And I'm not here to shit on you like Matt usually is. Thank you. I love and support you. May I touch your tush? Please, and commence touching.

Okay. First up, please welcome into the Tripp Ditch Club from Tampa in Florida, Samuel Oscoe. From Tampa and I love to pamper Samuel Oscoe. Yeah, we're pamper-er. Put some cucumbers on your eyes, unless you're allergic. Just let us know. We'll use something else. That's fine. Yeah, we're Pampere. Put some cucumbers on your eyes, unless you're allergic. Just let us know. Just let us know. Should've filled out a form. We'll use something else. That's fine.

But you should feel pampered. Next up from Ashford in Washington, it's Brendan. 10 out of Brendan. Yes, like 10 out of 10. Yes, every time. 10 out of Brendan. 10 out of Brendan. And next up from what is this place? Is that Finland? Oh wow.

No, surely not. Sorry. I got immediately distracted. It is in Finland. Wow. From Kangasala Definitely said that wrong and I apologize in Finland. It is Sander Rebane. I love to Panda to Sander Rebane. I love to Panda to Sander Rebane. So Sander, Brendan, Samuel, welcome in. Finally, we've been waiting for you. Dave Grohl is just setting up on the stage over there. So just give him like 10 minutes. He's just doing a little tune.

But please feel free to help yourself to as many muesli bars as you'd like. Take some for later, not that you can leave. And ablutions just over to your left. Make yourself at home. And thank you so much for joining us in the Triptych Club. Yes, well done. And welcomed. One and all.

Well, that about brings us to the end then, Dave. That's everything we need to do. Just a reminder for the 500th and what second time, that if you want to suggest a topic, you can. Anybody can. You don't have to be in this Patreon section to suggest a topic. There's a link in the show notes. It's also on our website, which is dougonpod.com.

And you can find us on social media at dougonpod. But apart from that, Davy boy, boot this baby home. Hey, we'll be back next week with another episode. But until then, thank you so much for listening and good bye. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh you should come to Manchester, we were just in Manchester. But this way you'll never, you'll never miss out and don't forget to

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