‘No more fight’: Beaconsfield miner’s sad health update
Todd Russell (left) and Brant Webb made global headlines when they were rescued from the Beaconsfield mine. Photo: AAP
Beaconsfield mine collapse survivor Todd Russell says he will “see out his days” at home with family and friends after years of health battles.
The 54-year-old made global headlines in 2006 when he and co-worker Brant Webb were rescued after spending two weeks trapped below the surface at the mine in northern Tasmania.
The collapse killed miner Larry Knight, with Russell and Webb returning to the surface after a daring rescue mission almost one kilometre underground.
The pair were initially presumed dead after a rockfall before their faint cries from within a small steel cage were heard by searching workmates days later.
In 2025, Russell announced he had started treatment in hospital for an undisclosed illness.
“After years of pain, uncertainty, appointments, treatments, setbacks, and endless battles, plus the emotional exhaustion of having to pick myself up time and time again, have left me with nothing left to give,” he posted on social media on Tuesday night.
“The time has come medically and physically where there are no further options on either front for me and there is no more fight left in me.
“I will leave hospital tomorrow after eight and half months for the last time to see out my days in my own home surrounded by my wife, kids, loved ones and friends.”
Russell thanked staff at the Launceston General Hospital for the support and kindness to “soften the daily grind” of a difficult journey.
In April, Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockliff recognised the two men on the 20th anniversary of the minor earthquake that caused the collapse.
Russell and Webb took a seemingly impossible situation and dealt with it with Australian humour, Rockliff said.
“At one point … Todd asked rescuers for a copy of the newspaper so he could start looking for a new job, joking he’d be losing his current one ‘for lazing about’,” he said.
Todd Russell revealed last year he was being treated for an undisclosed illness. Photo: Facebook
In the years since the rescue, Russell worked as a firefighter and motivational speaker and has told of the mental toll of the incident.
People who had not been underground did “not know what darkness is”, he said in a 2016 interview.
The Beaconsfield gold mine closed in 2012 but efforts are being made for it to return to production.
–AAP
