Nine Men Rescued from Collapsed Seattle Sewer Tunnel
After twenty-four hours trapped forty feet beneath the earth, workers in the North Trunk sewer project are pulled to safety.
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After having been imprisoned forty feet beneath the surface of the earth for nearly 24 hours, in imminent danger of being crushed to death by the tons of dirt and timbers that hung menacingly above their heads, the nine workmen who were yesterday morning buried by a cave-in of the North Trunk sewer near the exposition grounds, were liberated at 8 o'clock this morning. All day yesterday and throughout the night, rescue parties worked with all haste to reach the entombed workmen. Their efforts were rewarded when the drift which they had been running broke through into the narrow chamber that held their comrades prisoners. When led from the tunnel this morning, the rescued men showed no ill effects from their terrible experience. It is now definitely known that but two men, Duncan Robertson and August Stebel, whose bodies were recovered yesterday afternoon, lost their lives in the cave-in.
“Imprisoned forty feet beneath the surface of the earth for nearly 24 hours, in imminent danger of being crushed to death.”
Tunneling projects in Seattle have long been fraught with peril, from the early sewer projects of 1909 to the massive complexity of the 'Bertha' tunnel machine a century later. Labor safety remains a persistent friction point in the region's rapid development.
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