The effort to remove Kevin Lawrence from the mine collapse in Park County where he died will resume today, his family learned Tuesday afternoon.
“How long he’s been lying there is the worst part,” said his sister, Suzanne Lawrence of Denver.
Last weekend, his younger brother, Brad, found Lawrence, 51, partially crushed about 200 feet inside the small mine, located about 5 miles northwest of Fairplay at about 12,000 feet.
Kevin Lawrence had been working the mine claim by himself for about a year, after he bought it from the owner — for whom he had been working for several years before that, his sister said.
He had been searching for gold and silver in the mine and hoped to make enough progress this winter to hire at least five men to help in the spring, she said.
Efforts to recover his body have been held off since Sunday over mine-safety inspectors’ concerns about another collapse. Search-and-rescue teams in Park County have been eager to help, Suzanne Lawrence said.
“It’s half out,” she said of the body. “It’s not like they have to dig to try to locate him.”
Earlier Tuesday, she was distraught that officials had told the family it might be summer before the body could be recovered — or possibly never recovered at all.
The Park County Sheriff’s Office told the family late Tuesday afternoon the recovery effort would resume today but that it might take several days to get the body out safely.
Brad Lawrence went to check on his brother Saturday after Kevin was more than a week overdue in sending a text message letting everyone know he was OK, which was his routine, Suzanne Lawrence said.
He lived in the mine without electricity or heat and would use a solar charger for his phone, then cue a text message and wait on a signal until it eventually went through, his sister said.
On his way up the steep, two-hour hike to the mine, he carried the 8-inch-by-8-inch timbers to shore up the shaft, Suzanne Lawrence said.
“My brother was tough,” she said. “He was the hardest-working man I’ve ever known.”
She said the mine’s ceiling collapsed, but she doesn’t believe speculation that it was improperly braced, because her brother was a stickler for detail and safety.
He had worked as a miner most of his adult life and started collecting gems and reselling them as a child.
The family has not yet made funeral plans. He was single and had no children.
Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174 or jbunch@denverpost.com
