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Our American Stories

When One Man’s Faith Helped Free 33 Trapped Chilean Miners

Our American Stories

iHeartPodcasts

Documentary, Society & Culture

4.6817 Ratings

🗓️ 17 October 2025

⏱️ 12 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On this episode of Our American Stories, Greg Hall wasn’t looking for fame when Chile’s government asked for help rescuing 33 trapped miners. A businessman and Catholic deacon from Texas, he simply believed he could make a difference. Over 69 tense days, Hall and his team drilled through solid rock to reach the men the world feared were lost. He later said it was God who guided every turn of the drill. While the film The 33 told the story, Hall’s name was left out, which suited him just fine. For him, the miracle wasn’t the credit. It was that all 33 men saw daylight again.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

This is an I-Heart podcast.

0:04.0

What I told people, I was making a podcast about Benghazi.

0:08.5

Nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?

0:15.1

Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.

0:18.5

From prologue projects and Pushkin Industries, this is Fiasco, Benghazi.

0:23.6

What difference at this point does it make?

0:26.6

Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

0:33.6

You know, And we continue with our American stories.

0:48.2

The 33, starring Antonio Banderas,

0:51.4

recounts the extraordinary story of the 2010 Chilean mining disaster

0:56.0

that buried 33 miners, 2,300 feet, underground, for 69 days before their unprecedented rescue.

1:04.0

The world was riveted by the story, but the name of a man whose plan and drilling equipment

1:10.0

made that rescue possible was never

1:12.4

mentioned in the film. His character is conflated with one of his employees, a driller named

1:18.0

Jeff Hart played in the film by James Brolin. And as you're about to hear, that's all right

1:24.5

with business owner and Catholic deacon Greg Hall.

1:29.3

You've all heard about it, the Chilean Mind Rescue.

1:31.6

There's been books written about it.

1:33.5

There's a movie out about it called The 33, where James Brolin plays me and it's

1:38.1

amalgamation of myself and my driller.

1:40.1

Now I will tell you if you go see the movie, he's much more cranky than I ever was.

1:45.0

But I'm going to tell you the back story that the books don't have, that the movies don't have.

...

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