Pike River families in New Zealand say the discovery of bodies deep within the mine is not unexpected but it brings home the gravity of what happened.
More than a decade after the Pike River mine explosion that killed 29 men, the remains of at least two of the men have been found in images taken late last week from a new borehole.
Pathologists had reviewed the images and found they captured two sets of human remains, plus a possible third, police said.
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At a media briefing on Wednesday, two days before the 11th anniversary of the explosion, Superintendent Pete Read said it was not possible to recover the remains due to their location.
They were found in the alpine bolter section – the area furthest away from the entrance to the mine at the time.
According to the royal commission held after the disaster, eight men – Glenn Cruse, Christopher Duggan, Daniel Herk, Richard Holling, Brendon Palmer, Stuart Mudge, William Joynson and Peter Rodger – were in that area when the mine exploded.
Herk's mother, Jo Hall, said it was tough news to hear only two days from the 11-year anniversary.
"It is not one person [they found]. It is a group. It brings it home more."
She had always hoped her son had escaped the force of the blast but had now learned body parts were found in the area where he and seven others were working.
"That hurts," she said.
She was bitter that the Government sealed the mine before the borehole operation was finished.
"I wanted them to keep going and get in there. Now my only hope is for charges to be laid. Someone needs to pay for this."
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Holling's mother, Marion Curtin, who has always been against re-entry to the mine, said the discovery was "no big surprise".
"Twenty-nine men died there, so of course their remains are in the mine.
"We as a family have always wanted no recovery of any remains. We wished everything to be left."
Curtin "totally ignored" the anniversary.
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"An anniversary day is no better or no worse than any other day. My son died in an accident in the coal mine … and I miss him every day.
"I just cherish the wonderful memories that we have of Richard, and we are thankful that we had him for 41 years.
"We don't bear malice or want blame or retribution or anything like that."
Pike River widow Anna Osborne, who fought for re-entry, said it was an "emotional" day.
NZ First leader Winston Peters, whose coalition Government began the drift re-entry, questioned why it had taken 11 years to get these images and why the mine was sealed before the borehole sites were explored.
"If [the] imagery is with the clarity that the police claimed today, then it means that the site was and is recoverable," he said on Wednesday.
Pike River Recovery Minister Andrew Little said the findings were "significant", and meant the royal commission findings about where people were likely to have been could possibly be confirmed.
"We might get just a little more certainty about what exactly happened."
The remains were discovered in the "most remote part of the mine" and police had advised they could not be removed, he said.
"There will be mixed emotions about the fact that something tangible has been observed."
Read said police were working with forensic investigators on how the identities of the remains could be determined.
The additional borehole drilling programme started in June and allowed digital scanning and photography of the conditions in the mine, police said.
The images, which Read described as being very clear, would not be released publicly out of respect to the families of the deceased.
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He said there was a possibility of discovering more remains as the investigation continued.
An update from police to families in October said their investigation into the tragedy had uncovered evidence of a build-up of gas in the mine in the months before the explosion, and that management knew and deliberately ignored it.
The families' update said a camera had found no fire or heat damage in an area known as the goaf, where mining was happening.
Experts told police it was likely the second, third and fourth explosions happened in the area of the main fan, and the first explosion happened further into the mine, far enough away from the goaf for it to have survived relatively unaffected.
The Pike River Recovery Agency has completed a $50 million re-entry of the mine's access tunnel, or drift, with the aim of recovering evidence to help a police criminal investigation.
The mine has already been sealed at the 170-metre and 30m points of the drift.
The agency is rehabilitating the area and winding down operations before it hands the mine site over to the Department of Conservation for inclusion in the Paparoa National Park.
The mine would not be handed over until the police's investigation was complete, which Read said would take until the end of the year.
This story first appeared on Stuff and has been republished with permission.
