Kevin Stricklin, of the Federal Agency of Mine Safety and Health Administration, listens to a discussion on the rescue efforts Thursday, July 25, 2002, at the Quecreek Mine where nine coal miners are trapped in Somerset, Pa. Encouraged by a tinny tapping sound coming up from the depths, rescuers brought in a huge drill Thursday in a race to save the coal miners trapped 240 feet underground in a dark shaft filling up quickly with millions of gallons of frigid water. (SCOTT SPANGLER / AP)

John Unger promised his wife that if something bad ever happened on his job in the coal mine, he’d find a way to survive.

For 29 years, he kept that promise, always returning to the rural, century-old Somerset County home where they raised a family and tended to their cattle.

But all that changed shortly before 9 p.m. July 24, 2002, when Unger and eight other miners, relying on outdated maps, mistakenly bored through an abandoned section of a neighboring coal seam, unleashing 72 million gallons of frigid water that blocked their exit and trapping them 240 feet underground at the Quecreek Mine.

“I always told her, it didn’t matter how bad it got in there, when the dust cleared, I’d be there,” Unger said.

“This time,” he said, “I thought I bit off more than I could chew.”

While rescuers feverishly worked in stifling humidity for 77 hours, the miners, battling the effects of bone-chilling cold and a dwindling air supply, shared the little food they had left, huddled together for warmth and penned farewell letters to their loved ones on shreds of cardboard, sealing them in a lunch box for safekeeping.

Unger, now 72, said he signed a letter to his wife, “I’m sorry,” rather than, “I love you,” a nod to that promise he feared he was about to break.

Stranded in the grim darkness of a 4-foot-high chamber where the miners sought refuge, his mind was overwhelmed with thoughts of what would happen to his family and his farm if he didn’t survive.

“God gave us all a second chance,” Unger said. “In the mining industry, that doesn’t always happen.”

When it does, “you just appreciate life more every day. Even the bad days are good.”

That second chance came late July 27, when drillers punched a hole in the Lincoln Township mine about 100 yards from the miners and a crane operator meticulously lowered a slim, yellow, metal capsule to begin lifting them, one by one, through a 26-inch hole.

It was a precarious, untested rescue method, the product of brainstorming by teams working against the clock to save the miners before they drowned in the rising flood waters or suffocated when their air supply ran out.

With an army of reporters and TV cameras from around the world capturing every moment of the rescue, the first miner lifted out was foreman Randy Fogle, who was experiencing chest pains while underground.

Although each miner was suffering from the effects of the cold and dehydration, medical teams assigned to them marveled at what good shape they were in when they emerged from the mine. All made full recoveries after being transported to hospitals for treatment.

Unger was the fourth out of the mine. The ride to the top took six minutes.

“That was the best six minutes of my life,” he said.

More than just the miners’ outlook on life changed after the accident.

“We were normal people when we went in, [and when] we got back out, it was all changed,” Unger said.

In July 2002, Americans were still shaken by the 9/11 terrorist attacks just 10 months earlier. But the nation was buoyed by the happy ending that played out at Quecreek, 10 miles from where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into a field on Sept. 11, 2001.

Everyone wanted to hear the miners’ story, shake their hands, have their picture taken with them.

The miners met President George W. Bush, Oprah Winfrey and Pittsburgh sports figures.

A movie was made about their experience. They released a book.

The attention was hard to escape.

“The first year was the worst,” Unger said.

Most of them just wanted to return to the simplicity of their old lives.

For fellow miner Robert Pugh, 70, of Quemahoning, that was easier said than done.

In addition to the crush of the attention, the accident took an emotional toll.

“I still always think about it,” said Pugh, who worked in mines for 32 years and today maintains a goat and chicken farm about 4 miles from the Quecreek mine, which closed for good in 2018. “I still have problems sleeping at night.”

“Sometimes it’s hard to face it again,” he said. “Sometimes I can talk about it. Sometimes I can’t.”

His reaction is not unusual, according to psychologist Michele Mattis, director of behavioral sciences at Excela Health’s Latrobe Family Medicine Residency Program. She was a guidance counselor at Somerset Area High School at the time of the rescue and spent time with the Quecreek families, friends and community members.

Age and coping strategies are key factors in how a person responds to trauma, she said, and nightmares that last for years are common.

Pugh, who was the eighth man raised from the mine, said he is “a lot softer than I was [back then].”

Many of the miners have retreated from the limelight. Sometimes they attend community celebrations on the anniversary of the rescue.

Where the mine was now resides a museum and memorial that draw upward of 10,000 people a year, according to Bill Arnold, owner of the farm on which the mine was located and who serves as executive director of the Quecreek Mine Rescue Foundation and its visitor center.

Six of the miners — Blaine Mayhugh, Ronald Hileman, Mark Popernack, John Phillippi, Randy Fogle and Tom Foy — did not return calls seeking interviews for this story.

Miner Dennis Hall, 68, died May 13 at Conemaugh Memorial Medical Center in Johnstown.

Numerous accounts of the Quecreek accident credit Hall with saving a group of nine other men in the mine that day when he was able to call and warn them about the torrent of water headed their way after the coal seam was breached.

Some of the rescued miners returned to the bituminous coal industry, while others found work in different fields.

Pugh and Unger enjoy time with their children and grandchildren and have returned to an old hobby — hunting.

“I killed a deer that year I came out,” said Unger, who has amassed dozens of deer antlers, in addition to a mount of a kudu — a type of antelope — he shot in South Africa.

He wanted to return to mining, but after a “great protest” from his family, he compromised and went to work above ground in the industry before retiring in 2015.

It’s a job he loved from the day he started in 1974, earning $50 a day to save a $5,000 down payment for a house.

He and his wife, Sue, now married 50 years, have never opened that note that he penned while trapped underground.

“We never looked at it after I wrote it,” he said. “We never needed it.”

Eight of the nine miners settled lawsuits against the mine, the company that ran it and the firm that certified the maps used by the miners.

The second group of nine miners who scrambled to safety when the mine flooded that night also shared in the settlement.

Under the terms of that settlement, the award to the miners remains confidential, and the companies did not admit any negligence.

The miners are responsible for a lasting legacy in their industry.

An investigation concluded a lack of accurate underground maps led to the accident. That resulted in a push to collect, digitize and archive old mine maps as well as revamp state laws aimed at making coal mining safer.

“They’ve changed that so that won’t happen again,” Unger said proudly.

He appears to have no problem returning to the place where he almost died 20 year ago.

Two days after he was rescued, he was back — without the crowds and the blinding lights.

“I wanted to see … what was left there,” he said.

On a sunny morning this past April, Unger returned again, this time holding onto the cane he uses now after breaking his leg in a farming accident last year.

He sometimes talks in a soft tone when speaking about the ordeal. He said he believes a higher power — and not just those above ground — had a role in making sure the miners returned home.

“We all should’ve died here,” he said. “It ended up a complete miracle when it could’ve been a complete disaster.”