West Chester firm holds breath for success in Chile

Ed Breiner never doubted that the drilling rig manufactured by his company, Schramm, Inc. of West Chester, would be able to punch through 2,200 feet of solid rock to reach 33 trapped Chilean miners.

What worried him was how rescuers would extract the men once the the hole was dug.

On Wednesday, with the unprecedented rescue well under way and the world rejoicing at what appeared to be the happiest of endings to the 68-day drama, Breiner was ready to breath a sigh of relief.

Almost.

"I'm not going to relax until the job is done and the last guy is out," said Briener, 54, chief executive officer of the 110-year old company, one of two Pennsylvania firms that played critical roles in the race to free the miners who were trapped on Aug. 5 when the copper and gold mine collapsed in remote northern Chile. The other is Center Rock, Inc. from Somerset County in western Pennsylvania, which manufactured the drill bit used in the operation.

By mid-afternoon, with more than a third of the miners hauled to the surface one-by-one in a specially-made, manhole-sized capsule and the rescue looking to be an astounding success, the world celebrated with parties, tweets and tears of joys.

At Schramm, however, it was business as usual. No champagne corks popping, as was happening on the ground at the San Jose Mine, nor were Schramm employees huddled around televisions watching the increasingly exhuberant rescuers, as people were doing all over the world.

"We're working," said Breiner, whose company employs 157 people and has been in West Chester since 1917.

"We're excited and proud to be part of this," he said, The rescue was "very encouraging. I'd like to see the 33rd miner brought back to the surface," he said, adding that he stayed up late Tuesday night watching on televsion as the first two men emerge from the Schramm drilled tunnel.

The company will celebrate on Friday with a luncheon for employees to thank them for their efforts and welcome back Jeff Roten, a field technician who was on site and helped keep the drill running.

Roten, who was flying home Wednesday, was one of two Schramm representatives at the mine. The other was Claudio Soto, the company's regional sales manufacturer for South America.

The party will be typically low-key.

"Our guys will grill something and eat lunch in the shop where we set up tables and chair. Nothing fancy," Breiner said.

After the mine collapsed, Chile's government summoned drillers to the site to evaluate the situation. Nine responded - five of them were Schramm customers. One, Terra Service, drilled the bore hole that first reached the miners, who sent up a note saying they were alive after 17 days underground.

Then in early September, GeoTech brought in the Schramm T-130 drill and components on a five-vehicle convoy, a development cheered by miners' families who waved Chilean flags and chanted slogans.

The drilling effort "was a complex, difficult process on a good day," said Breiner.

The fact that they had to drill through solid rock was actually "advantageous," he said. It eliminated the need to line the entire half-mile tunnel with steel casing for support. It also reduced the dangers of flooding and explosions.

Drilling and mining have not gotten a lot of good publicity lately, he said, especially with last summer's oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico and other environmental concerns related to the industry.

"It's good to see drilling looked at in a positive way."