Miner “Super Mario” Sepulveda calls talk of sex ‘wrong’

NEW YORK - Chilean miner “Super” Mario Sepulveda has finally opened up about the ordeal he and fellow miners faced while they were trapped underground for months.

While the miners struggled to survive and seek a way out, depression overcame many of them, he said.

“The 17 days before that moment were pure hell,” The New York Daily News quoted Sepulveda as saying.

So much so, the miners had actually sworn to maintain a “Pact of Silence” about that time. However, that “silence” sparked rumours among family members and in the press that the miners were having sex.

“Nothing like that ever went on. We were too busy trying to survive to think of sex… Saying we had sex down there with each other is just plain wrong,” Sepulveda said, who found the rumours offensive.

The reason to keep quiet about that time, he said, was because of how some of the men behaved. He indicated there were fights and the “younger, less educated” men had a lot of difficulty dealing with the situation.

Although he was dubbed “Super Mario” by the press, and lauded by men who were trapped with him, Sepulveda insists he was no “superstar.”

“I am a miner. I will always be a miner… I am a humble man and I am happy to have played a small part in an event, which has made the world come together, if just for a moment,” he said. (ANI)