The words of Luis Urzúa came over a crackling line but were uttered with the professional calm of a man in control: "Shift foreman speaking."
The 54-year-old has become the leader of 33 men trapped deep underground in a Chilean mine for the last 19 days and, for a few dramatic moments late on Monday night, he was their interlocutor with the world.
The first audio contact with the men, who are expected to have to remain 670m (2,200ft) underground in the San José mine for another four months before they can be rescued, was initiated by the country's minister for mining, Laurence Golborne. He assured the trapped miners that a rescue team was working on their release, before asking the obvious question: "How are you?"
"We're good," replied Urzúa. "Waiting to be rescued." The foreman was drowned out as his trapped colleagues applauded, cheered and, in a spontaneous outburst that brought tears to the eyes of those on the surface, sang Chile's national anthem.
Golborne told the men that water was being sent in "doves", the nickname given to the 5ft-long capsules being used to deliver supples to the men through the single borehole that has penetrated down to their shelter. "Look, we've been drinking a bit of water," Urzúa interjected. "But we haven't eaten much lately, just the food that we have in the shelter."
That was an understatement: under Urzúa's strict regime, which includes work shifts and safety procedures, the men have survived almost three weeks on rations of just two small spoonfuls of tuna, a sip of milk and a biscuit every 48 hours.
Urzúa worked for years as the coach of a local football club, an experience that psychologists now cite as key in his ability to lead and motivate the 33 miners.
"We are happily surprised because they are in much better shape than we could have hoped for," said Alberto Iturra, the leading psychologist on the rescue team. "We were expecting to find a much more distressed group, without the ability to reason, with slow reactions and limited hearing and eyesight."
The men have already been trapped underground longer than all but a few miners rescued in recent history.
Last year, three miners trapped in a flooded mine in southern China survived for 25 days, and in 1983 two miners in north-eastern China were rescued after 23 days. Few other rescues have taken more than two weeks.
Officials remain concerned about the mental health of the miners over the months to come, and have discussed sending them antidepressants or allowing them to talk to psychologists to keep their spirits up.
Rescue teams sent down oxygen after the miners suggested there was not enough air in the stretches of the mine beneath the collapsed main shaft. They also began to drop in letters from family members and loved ones.
"Can you imagine? After 30 years of marriage we will start sending each other love letters again," said Lilianett Ramírez, whose 63-year-old husband, Mario Gómez, is among those trapped. She was first to send a letter down to her husband yesterday. "I told him to be very patient, that we're all camped out here, following his every heartbeat. That he shouldn't become desperate, and that he try to be extremely tranquil," she said.
Engineers have already worked to reinforce the borehole using a long hose to coat its walls with a metallic gel to decrease the risk of rockfalls. The lubricant also makes it easier to deliver the capsules, the first of which held rehydration tablets and a high-energy glucose gel to help the miners' digestive systems. It took an hour for the packages to reach the trapped men.
The Chilean government faces enormous logistical challenges in drilling new boreholes to provide supplies to the men and, eventually, pull them out. Rescue efforts advanced considerably yesterday as a third borehole was on the verge of breaking through to the miners, and a huge machine arrived to carve out a tunnel just wide enough for the miners to be pulled out one by one. That machine will not begin drilling for several days.
Andres Sougarret, leading the rescue effort, estimated that it would take three to four months to pull the men out. But Davitt McAteer, a former assistant secretary of the US Mine Safety and Health Administration, called that "perhaps the most conservative model".
Health officials are seeking advice from Nasa on how the 33 miners can remain sane and healthy while rescue efforts continue. According to officials at the health ministry, conditions in the underground chamber are similar to those faced by submarine crews or astronauts.
In their conversations with rescuers, each of the men reported feeling hungry but well, except for one who had a stomach problem. Despite the hardships for 33 men living an underground existence in a bunker the size of a small apartment, humour has not abandoned the men: asked what they needed, the men listed canned peaches, toothbrushes and a chela – slang for a cold beer.
Golborne sought to keep up the men's spirits, informing them that "the whole country" had erupted in celebrations after contact was made with them.
At one stage, Urzúa asked what had happened to a group of colleagues who had been at the mouth of the mine at the time of the collapse on 5 August.
Golborne's answer – that there had not been a single fatality as a result of the accident – prompted another round of excited cheers.