To the world Todd Russell and Brant Webb were heroes who miraculously cheated almost certain death 20 years ago when they were entombed underneath a thousand tonnes of rock for two terrifying weeks.
“What we went through all those years ago will always connect us, and I feel very sad for Toddy’s family,” Brant told New Idea after Todd sadly died of leukaemia aged just 54.
The death of one of the two men who survived almost insurmountable odds all those years ago shocked the world with friends, family and complete strangers paying tribute Todd who was tormented with PTSD after the rescue.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese praised Todd’s “stoicism, resilience and good humour”. His friends called him a “true-blue mate and Aussie legend”. Complete strangers lamented the loss of a hero.
“It was a cruel way to go, after everything we went through together,” explains Brant, 57, who also suffered PTSD and is even now waiting on an operation to relieve the daily pain he endures from where his back was crushed by tonnes of falling rocks.
“We went through hell together, and we fought our own demons and struggled with our mental health afterwards. It never leaves you. I last spoke to Todd two and a half months ago, and he was struggling to lift his head up.
“I was shocked. He was parked outside the IGA and looked grey-faced when I walked past him. He didn’t have a lot of energy, and he said, ‘I’m not doing too well, mate’. That’s all he could get out.”
“I spoke to his wife three weeks ago and his ex-wife a week ago and they said he’s not too well and they didn’t know how long he was going to last. They didn’t say he was on his deathbed. But you could tell something wasn’t right. They wanted to stay strong.”
Todd and Brant were presumed dead after an earthquake caused a massive rockfall at the Tasmanian mine on Anzac Day 2006. When the body of Brant’s mate Larry Knight, 44, was found the next day, hope was all but extinguished.
The world erupted with hope and joy five days later when rescuers heard Todd and Brant singing Kenny Roger’s classic hit The Gambler (the only song they both knew). Nine days later they both miraculously walked out of the mine.
“I get up every morning and thank my lucky stars I get to see another day,” Todd revealed four years ago, before he was so cruelly struck down earlier this year with a terminal leukaemia diagnosis which he kept secret from all but his closest family members.
On November 3 he went public on social media to share that “years of pain, uncertainty, appointments, treatments, setbacks and endless battles plus the emotional exhaustion of having to pick myself up time and time again, have left me with nothing left to give”.
“The time has come, medically and physically, where there are no further options on either front for me & there is no more fight left in me … (for) the daily grind of what has been an incredibly difficult journey.”
Todd and Brant will be forever connected in the eyes of the world, but the two men, who were not close friends before the mine collapse, fell out some years after the rescue as they both struggled with their mental health and the pressure of world attention.
“The only thing we had in common is that we both wanted to give back to the community that stood behind us and did all that they could for our wives and kids while we were stuck underground,” Brant says.
And it is that shared love of their tight-knit community that Brant, 57, now wants to celebrate as a tribute to Todd – with a new campaign to raise money for the charity they set up to help underprivileged kids after the mine collapse.
“We are going to launch a commemorative beer for the Russell Webb legacy,” Brant reveals exclusively to New Idea.
“We were going to do it last week, but Todd got really sick, and now we’re going to launch it on December 9.”
A percentage of the money raised through the sale of every can of the new specially brewed beer from the Miners Gold Brewery will be donated to the Russell Webb Legacy in a very Aussie tribute to Todd.
Brant has enlisted the help of Todd’s ex-wife Caroline who is a director of the charity, and his current wife Donna, and hopes the fund-raising tribute will bring some comfort to Todd’s three children, Liam, Maddie and Trent.
“Todd set up the Russell Webb Legacy as a community initiative to help out children in the Launceston to Green’s beach area, and we both donated 10 per cent of the profit of our book and other jobs we did to get it started,” he says.
“I’m sure Todd will be there in spirit when we launch the commemorative beer at the Miners Gold Brewery, and I hope people will get behind it as a lasting tribute to what we both went through.
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