Chile miners: Three of the rescued men are discharged from the hospital

Oct. 14, 2010 10:48 PM PT

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Three of the 33 men rescued from the collapsed San Jose mine in Chile were released from the hospital Thursday night, the first to head home after doctors earlier declared all of the miners free of shock and generally in good health.

The three men -- Edison Pena, Juan Illanes and Carlos Mamani -- were the first of the group to be discharged from Copiapo Regional Hospital following their return to the surface after being trapped half a mile underground for 69 days.

Rescuers pulled the men from the mine Wednesday, the first just minutes after the day began and the last nearly 22 hours later.

Officials said the men spent a somewhat restless night at the hospital, but none appeared to be suffering from serious illness. One miner was being treated for pneumonia.

More miners were expected to be discharged from the hospital Friday.

Read more about the Chile miners.

-- Chris Kraul in Copiapo, Chile

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Chris Kraul

Chris Kraul covered South America for the Los Angeles Times from his base in Bogota, Colombia. He joined the paper in 1987 and was business editor of the San Diego edition until it closed in 1992. He then began covering the border and Mexican economies until his assignment to The Times’ Mexico City bureau in 2001. He reopened the paper’s Bogota bureau in 2006. He has also covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He is a graduate of the University of South Florida and also has been a reporter at the San Jose Mercury News, San Diego Union-Tribune and the San Diego Business Journal.