The news from Utah has been bleak, as the fourth hole drilled to find the missing miners gave poor indications of their survival.  That couple with the unstable mountain that has claimed the lives of three rescuers has all but removed hope, not just of rescuing them, but of finding them at all.

Hope All but Extinguished at Utah Mine

Six coal miners caught in a cave-in may never be found and could forever be lost to the still-quivering mountain, officials conceded Sunday, abandoning the optimism they’ve maintained publicly for nearly two weeks.

Air readings from a fourth hole drilled more than 1,500 feet into the mountainside found insufficient oxygen to support life, and the latest efforts to signal the men were again met by silence.

“It’s likely these miners may not be found,” said Rob Moore, vice president of Murray Energy Corp., co-owner of the Crandall Canyon Mine.

The news marked a shift in tone in mine officials’ assessments of the chances the men would be rescued, hopes they had maintained even after three rescuers were killed and six more hurt Thursday in another “bump” inside the mountain.

My prayers to them and their families.

As I thought about the miners I have to wonder what type of person would choose such a scary job.  I readily admit that there is no way i would ever do such work, I don’t have even close to enough nerve to do so.

But the miners are like many of us, we do the jobs we can to make a living.  Indeed, there are many jobs like mining that are almost hereditary in nature, as each generation follows in the footsteps of the preceding.

I am sure some of the people working in this nations mines never considered doing anything else.

I cannot fathom it, but then again, watching Dirty Jobs on TV provides me with a lot of jobs I would shudder and decline to do.