in the united states and around the world. i m wolf blitzer, and you are in i m wolf blitzer, and you are in the situation room. captions by vitac www.vitac.com this is live pictures now, and the rescue operation continuing. this is from pictures half a mile underground. the next miner going to the top is franklin lobos. he is 53 years old and served as a electrician in the mine, and he played professional soccer at one time. he is about to get into the capsule, and once it reaches the ground, we will see it come in and this is going to be miner number 27 who will be rescued out of 33. gary tuchman has been covering the story for us so ably over the past several days. he has watched it all unfold. gary, we talked a little bit about lobos and like so many of the miners, every one of the miners has a personal story.
gary, sometimes word cans fail. reporter: no question about it, larry. tell me if you feel this way. this reminded me of july 20, 1969 when neal armstrong and buzz aldren stepped on the moon for the first time. you are waiting, you are tense. it took 15 minutes. it finally came up, the capsule and out stepped the first miner. not only do you have one miner, but a second miner who we hope will come up safe in about seven minutes but it shows this capsule can work with a human being inside. they tested the capsule without a human being. they didn t know until the first miner made it up that it would definitely, 100% work. it has. that gives a lot of comfort to the family members for the other 32 miners who are 2,300 feet
capsule, red, white and blue and picks up a miner and goes to the surface. all the men emerge with sunglasses. pulled out of the ground, they haven t been seeing light for the last 68 days, 69 days, so they have those sunglasses on to protect them. some of the most emotional moments from the miners themselves as they cheer and cry and greet their families and one handed out what appeared to be rocks to officials and rescue workers and keep hearing what you might have thought was chile s soccer chant. it s chi-chi-chi-! le-le-le! it s been modified. chi-chi-chi-! le-le-le! viva chile! chile president sebastian pineiro greeting the miners. the minister of mining is there. he hopes tonight will be a huge
approval rating. wolf, i can just imagine that conversation honey, why don t you let me take this one. yeah. i think that s a good one. kate, i think that s true. she s very, very popular and can help the candidates who are in trouble like russ feingold and in wisconsin right now. three weeks to go until election day. see how much you can help because as you pointed out in the brand new cnn time magazine poll, he s down to ron johnson. the wealthy challenger will continue to watch this story. we re watching what s happening below the earth right now. miner number 26. he s now in that capsule you can see the wheel turning, bringing him to the top. talking about claudio acuna. he s 34 years old. his family is waiting at the top. we ll watch it live unfold. i guess in about ten minutes you can see the 2-year-old daughter there and his wife. they ve been brought over for this emotional reunion. you can t get enough of this. stay on top of this story and
they are waiting as that door opens. 18-year-old jimmy sanchez, the youngest of the 33 miners about to emerge from that capsule. his father is waiting for him. very eager. it has been incredible. watching the emotions of these people. here comes jimmy sanchez. and see a smile there as he is about to emerge. there he is. on solid ground. he has stepped out of the capsule that took him 700 meters to the surface from that place he has been for 68 days. listen to them.