By Mandy Suhr

Staff Writer

At 4 a.m., when some college students are just going to bed, children like John Velez, 13, and his younger brother Jaime, 11, wake up to get ready to go to El Pescadero, a mine in Colombia. On Nov. 24, the Velez boys walked along the Cauca River, just outside of their village of Irra, Colombia, until they reached the large open-pit gold mine where they worked. This was a routine that the boys had grown accustomed to as they practiced it daily, working the mines with their father, Jaime Jesus Velez.

Unfortunately, what started as an ordinary day ended in terror for the Velez family and an entire region of Colombia. A mine collapse resulted in the deaths of at least 67 people as reported by the Colombian Red Cross. Among those lost were at least six children-- young boys who spent their short lives knowing little more than the world of the mine. One of the boys killed was John Velez.

Schools are available in this region of the country, but many children choose to work instead, sometimes out of necessity to help support their family in this poverty-stricken area. Although miners only made a few dollars a day, their income was higher than that of the pickers, who harvest coffee and crops. More than anything else, the money that was made from work at the mine was used for survival. Carlos Alberto Velez, (who is not related to John and Jaime) also lost a brother last Thursday.

``We would find gold; that is normal...But we do not celebrate and scream out when we find gold. It just means that there will be enough to eat,'' he said.

In addition, the workers see mining as a way out of a beggar lifestyle, which would be the likely alternative in an area dominated by the mines. Juan Carlos Aricapa, 13, who barely escaped with his life on the 24, but who plans to go back to work in the mines said, ``You can make your own money. You do not have to ask the rich...You work for yourself.'' Jaime and John's mother, Gloria Paro, also noted this sense of pride that the boys took in working. As recorded in the New York Times, she said that she would often encourage her children to go to school, but she didn't push them too much, because she saw that they were good miners. Ms. Paro said of her late son, John Velez, ``He said he did not want to go to school, that he wanted to work.''

At El Pescadero and other mines, families would each take part in the work, with the father digging, the children carrying dirt and the mother panning for gold. It has become some what of a tradition. Older children would eventually start digging themselves and carry on the tradition.

The locals were not oblivious to the potential dangers of the mine, but they were left with few others choices other than laboring at El Pescadero if they wanted to support themselves. Maria del Carmen Castro, whose 15-year-old son, Carlos Ladino, was killed in the collapse said, ``I knew it was dangerous. It would scare me, but we had to live, so this supported us. Here, there is nothing else.''

Workers had little warning before last Thursday's tragedy, except for the sighting of bits of falling dirt from the edge of the mountain, what Jaime Jesus Velez deemed ``a sure signal of a coming landslide,'' as reported in the New York Times. Some laborers were able to run for safety immediately after this initial sighting was made, but many were not able to make it out of the more prosperous, deeper portions of the mine.

Many, including John Velez, were crushed or drowned in the mud and muck. Mr. Velez was unable to save his son from the landslide, and he, along with numerous other parents, relatives, and friends, will never forget the horror that took place on Nov. 24. The terror and tragedy can be heard in John Velez's statement to his father, and his last words on earth: ``Daddy, Daddy, save me, save me.'' And then he was covered.