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He graduated in 1981 without a clear idea of where to go next.

He had a serious interest (mine safety)
but no obvious place to express it.

He worked for a spell with an engineering consulting firm in Chicago
but found it dull and beside the point.

He toyed with going to work as a field engineer for a coal mining company and even spent a summer in mines in Wyoming.

There he was reminded of the realities of a coal miner’s life.

“A guy says, ‘Let’s go to a bar.’

It’s 50 guys and one woman stripper.

He says, ‘Let’s go somewhere else.’

It was the exact same scene:
50 guys and one woman stripper.

It made me so depressed
— that’s all I need is to be one of those 50 fucking guys.”

Then Bieniawski called to say that he’d just received new funding for a PhD student.

He wanted Chris to be that student.

All Chris needed was a thesis topic.

The coal mining industry soon supplied it.

On Dec. 19, 1984, a roof collapsed inside the Wilberg Mine,
just outside of Salt Lake City.

The miners at Wilberg had been trying to break the world record for the most coal mined in a single day.

Nine senior officials from the mine’s owner, Utah Power and Light,
had entered the mine to witness history.

Suddenly, a fire broke out in one of the two main tunnels.

Before the executives or 18 working coal miners could escape,
the roof in the second tunnel collapsed and blocked their exit.

All 27 people wound up trapped inside an inferno.

It would take a year to recover their bodies.

And Christopher Mark thought:

If they’d figured out the right formula for their pillars, they’d all still be alive.