Somebody on CNN nailed it: this was Chile’s Apollo 13. And they carried it off brilliantly, and dare I say with panache even – 33 for 33 alive, cheering, chanting, singing, one guy doing schtick with a bag of rocks. The win here, as the President of Chile said, is that from now on when people think of Chile, they won’t think of earthquakes or Pinochet; they’ll think how 33 guys lasted 69 days underground and were all brought home safe.
As an act of national rebranding on the world stage, you couldn’t ask for better.