The West Virginia University Mine Rescue Team, based at the WVU Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources, is the best in the world.
Named the winner of the 2025 Intercollegiate Mine Emergency Rescue Development competition held Feb. 17-21 at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colorado, the team of Statler College experts and eight students from multiple disciplines now boasts three consecutive international victories along with four national wins.
Nine teams from the United States, Canada and Germany competed in this year’s international competition.
The WVU Mine Rescue Team includes mining, electrical and mechanical engineering students Trent Cavanaugh, Ashton Crawford, Grace Hansen, August Lasko, Evan Rice, Dylan Shilling, Ian Stengel and Justin Waybright.
Team advisor and Mining and Industrial Extension Director Josh Brady and trainers Randy Clark, John Helmick, Brian Malott and Sean Rhodes bring decades of expertise in the field and skilled guidance to the team’s training and competition preparation.
“Overall, our team performed incredibly well. Our biggest strengths are that we work hard in practice and train for the unexpected,” said Hansen, team briefing officer and a mechanical engineering student from Westlake, Ohio. “As a team, we also utilize each other’s strengths and cover each other’s weaknesses. We prioritize working together like a well-oiled machine.”
At this year’s competition, the WVU Mine Rescue Team earned first place in four categories: the team mine rescue exercise, the smoke maze, the individual BG-4 bench and the individual 240-R bio bench. These victories secured their third consecutive overall champion title.
“We continue to prove that consistent practice and old-fashioned hard work produces results,” Brady said. “The team works like an in-shape human body — each member has different responsibilities, and they have again demonstrated working together as one is unbeatable.”
The team mine rescue and smoke maze exercises took place in the underground Edgar Experimental Mine. Students were tasked with navigating a smoke maze and locating missing miners, administering first aid and performing a high-angle rope rescue to save a simulated miner stranded 30 feet in the air.
Anticipating this challenge, team members Shilling and Rice earned rope rescue technician certifications during the summer as part of the team’s rigorous preparations. This challenge offered the most realistic mine rescue experience that most team members will encounter in their careers.
The WVU Mine Rescue Team didn’t just win this category — the team was the only one to place since other teams exceeded the exercise’s time limit.
“We spent months training three days a week at 6 a.m., plus an additional week-long emergency response first aid course,” Hansen said. “We challenged ourselves by practicing different medical triage and underground mine rescue scenarios.”
The individual bench challenges tested team members’ ability to troubleshoot issues with breathing apparatuses commonly worn by mine rescue teams. While teamwork is crucial, individual dedication played a key role in dominating these categories, as Waybright secured the BG-4 bench and Stengel won the 240-R bio bench.
In the final category — first aid — teams responded to a simulated mine explosion, managing the emergency and assisting actors portraying victims. WVU placed second in this exercise.
“The entire team stepped up when needed and we all worked together. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever experienced,” said Waybright, team captain and a mining engineering major from Parkersburg. “These challenges not only tested us mentally, but physically as well. All five of us underground persevered through everything that was thrown at us, and we were able to make decisions that won us the competition.”
More than a prestigious title, participation in events like this one provides students with valuable, real-world experiences which can’t be found anywhere else.
“The skills I have learned in these competitions have prepared me to work under pressure with a team and as an individual. All of us utilize our strengths to come together to solve our competition problems efficiently and effectively,” Hansen said. “In terms of career preparation, we have learned how to show up early in the morning consistently, how to solve problems on the fly and how to communicate and collaborate under pressure.”
Brady said the competition is also about the networking and connections students make on a global level.
“The competition exposes our students to different cultures, methods and problem-solving approaches,” he said. “Each team member has made lifelong friends from around the world, sharing experiences that will influence them as engineering students and professionals.”
