Wife grieves: no chance to say goodbye

HELPER — Even until late Friday, Nelda Erickson held on to hope that her husband, Don, was still alive, despite nothing day after day but bad news for more than three weeks about his fate and that of five other men trapped deep inside the Crandall Canyon Mine since Aug. 6.

She stayed away Friday from what would be the final briefing at the Desert Edge Christian Chapel for families of the missing miners.

By the time the briefing was over, the crushing call came to her home from a Mine Safety and Health Administration official:

Rescue attempts were over.

And more bad news: Recovery of bodies may not be possible.

"It's hard," Nelda said Saturday inside her modest home. "It just makes it more final. Before, we had a little bit of hope. Now, it makes it more final for me."

He is gone, her husband, who turned 50 in March; who decided to stop driving trucks so that he could provide more for his wife with a higher paying job in the mines; who the younger men in the mine called "old man" for his wisdom and leadership.

Don had talked occasionally with Nelda about "bounces" in the Crandall mine, events during which the mountain above and around the mine's cavities shifted and settled, causing walls to crumble and coal to come loose.

"He didn't think it was anything serious," Nelda said. "They had them all the time. He never complained about them being worse than before."

Then came Aug. 6 and a bounce underground so powerful that it registered as a 3.9 magnitude seismic event. Mine co-owner Bob Murray said it was an earthquake. Scientists said it was something inside the mine that caused the collapse. Some blamed it on the type of mining taking place at the time.

Nelda said Saturday she wasn't ready to talk about Murray, who thrust himself into the public spotlight almost from Day One and became the repeated bearer of bad news, the target of both disdain and praise.

Seven separate holes were bored into the mine, each a search for signs of life, each coming up empty.

Then efforts underground to reach the six men ended after three men were killed Aug. 16 in another collapse.

"Sure, I wish there was more that they could do," Nelda said about rescue efforts.

But she's become well versed on how bad conditions in the mine are — bad air, mud and water pouring in, unstable walls and ceilings.