Trapped Miners Ate Coal, Drank Urine
‘The Meng brothers felt pretty good about their chances of making it out of the collapsed coal mine, until the sound of digging from outside stopped.
With no food or water, they were forced to eat coal and drink their own urine from discarded bottles. When they were too exhausted to try to dig themselves out, they slept huddled together in the cold and dark.
Meng Xianchen and Meng Xianyou finally clawed their way to the surface after nearly six days underground – a rare tale of survival in China’s coal mines, the world’s deadliest, where an average of 13 workers are killed every day.
The two even managed to crack jokes about their wives remarrying once they were dead after they emerged Friday from the illegal mine – which had no oxygen, ventilation or emergency exits – in Beijing’s Fangshan district.’
