Breaking News: Man thrown down mine shaft by hi-jackers.
“Send down two body bags, there is another body down here!” Two bodies were discovered after a hi-jack suspect told police how they dumped a victim in an abandoned mine shaft.
The victim, who lived in Bronkhorstpruit, was hi-jacked near Middelburg last week Tuesday 03 November.
The rescue team set out early the morning, following a footpath winding through a patch of dense black wattle trees, that led them to the daunting 50 metre drop, a sudden gaping hole in the ground.
Along the way discarded personal documents like payslips, a passport, bank card and a belt found at the edge of the shaft, were subconsciously preparing the team for what they were going to find at the bottom of the shaft.
It is hard to believe that such a shaft still exist. An unnamed safety officer on the scene said that the hole was made by miners in the 1890’s.
“We went down one of the shafts and you can still see where they mined the coal with pickaxes. Those people were not stupid. How they knew that there were coal down there is beyond me.”
Two similar shafts not far from the third one, were filled up. This one, allegedly belonging to a different mining company, was left unattended.
It is said that the victim was thrown down the mine shaft alive, with his hands tied behind his back. The police team were led to the shaft by the suspect, who admitted to the crime the night before.
The team had to go back to get a stronger flashlight before looking down the shaft and making the grizzly discovery. At the bottom of the shaft lay the body of a man.
The next day the sun reduced the shaft into a seemingly impenetrable black hole, one that even a flashlight couldn’t illuminate. A black hole that a rescue worker would soon descend into.
It took the rescue team hours to plan, assemble, plan some more and reassemble enough ropes, anchor points and safety equipment to make sure that the body of the man they came to retrieve, will be the last victim of the daunting mine shaft.
The first member of the rescue team, Sergeant Leon Harrington, was slowly let down the shaft by rope. As he touched the side of the shaft, boulders came loose and made faint explosive sounds as they hit the bottom.
It was when he finally reached the bottom that the muffled call came: “There are two bodies down here!”.
“I suspected that this was not the first person they threw down that hole. You can see by all the personal items we found, that this was their dumping place. The place they came to get rid of all the unwanted items in the cars they hi-jacked, like documents and people,” a policeman, who would like to stay anonymous, said.
A second rescuer, carrying a stretcher and the requested amount of body bags, went down after Sergeant Harrington has moved out of the way of falling rocks.
The men spent a little less than two hours down the shaft. Putting the decaying bodies into bags and strapping the first body into the stretcher to be brought up.
Capt. Harrington came up with the first body. Hauled up by a team of policemen and members of the fire department. The stench was almost unbearable. The body was found with hands and feet tied together. There was a material bag pulled over the victim’s head.
The second rescue worker brought the second victim to the surface.
But the operation was only half complete. Al the ropes and equipment had to be retrieved and packed up without any injury. The team met in front of the police station at 09:00.
The last body was brought up at around 14:30. Exhaustion was visible on the faces of the whole team, but especially on those of the two men who went down the shaft.
I left shortly after the team came together to congratulate each other on the successful retrieval, and cautioned each other that the danger was not over and yet more concentration was needed during the packing up of the gear.
“If you fall down that hole, that’s it. Your wife and children can come put flowers at the edge, because that will be your grave.”
• Police were assisted by highly trained volunteers from the mining industry. Certain members of the rescue team asked not to be identified.
• The suspects are expected to appear in court today (Monday). Read more about them, the crimes they are suspected to have committed and the rage of one of the identified victim’s family in our Tuesday edition, on sale in Middelburg this afternoon.
Read update here: (Update): Video: Hi-jack suspects in court
