Almost one billion, that is 1,000,000,000,000 people followed the rescue of the 33 trapped miners at the San José near Copiapó, Chile, for nearly 24 hours. Just imagine, that’s more than 1/7th or 14% of the world’s entire population! Hundreds of thousands of blog posts, twitter feeds, emails, comments in various forms and phone messages expressed concern, support, gratitude and love for the miners and their families.

I wonder what effect such an opening of hearts and outpouring of compassion and positive emotions from all around the globe has had on all of us. Could such a positive rallying and rooting for the same wonderful cause possibly have affected the crime rate around the world, for instance?

What about on a more personal level? Did you notice yourself soften, perhaps, and allow your heart to open up more? Maybe you found yourself reaching out more or demonstrating your gratitude and love more readily?

While being caught up in watching the rescue, it occurred to me that in my life time of more than five decades now, I can only remember two other instances that united people around the globe in a similarly focused and positive a manner as this particular event. Of course, we did not have the same technology to share information with the ease, detail and immediacy that is available to us now.

Can you guess which two events I’m referring to? I remember when Nelson Mandela was freed from prison on Robben Island, South Africa, in February 1990. I also have memories of the “successful failure” of the Apollo 13 mission to the moon, where all the astronauts eventually returned safely in April 1970. Perhaps the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 captured some of the world’s imagination, but I’m not sure it reached truly worldwide attention.

What’s important here is this: If I were to make a list of news events that garner our attention globally, I would have no problem naming at least half a dozen events a year. However, they are all associated with disasters, such as the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the flooding in Pakistan or the toxic spill in Hungary. It seems rare that positive news stories sustain the world’s [media] attention.

Obviously, the event in Chile started out as a disaster as well. So what happened here that’s different? I suggest determination, hope, faith, focused attention and leadership stand out. Apparently giving up was not an option. Instead of diverting focus to lay blame and culpability, the government in this case assumed full responsibility for the rescue and focused all efforts on this task while reaching out to the world to ask for insights, technology and support.

The focus on first finding the miners and later rescuing them motivated and sustained not only the families, but everyone around them. Setting clear priorities that were strongly heart-centred, I believe, constitutes the core of the incredible community that began to be built at the San José mine and eventually spread to the rest of the world.

Neither the families nor the government wasted valuable time, energies and resources in attempts to force the mining company to accept responsibility for the rescue operations. (That does not mean the company is not responsible, though, for all the many violations of safety precautions!)

What emerged instead were individuals and groups who either grew into or took leadership roles and carried them out as servant leaders. They cared for each individual and looked out for the good of all concerned, provided guidance and willingly made difficult decisions while opening up to support and wisdom of others.

From all the reports we heard throughout those 69 days, similar determination, hope, faith and focused attention on priorities enabled the miners underground to survive the first 17 days, however gruelling they must have been. Their mutual respect and support as well as the leadership qualities of many individuals who were given or assumed key roles to ensure survival, such as the miners‘ shift foreman Luis Urzúa or the spiritual leader Mario Gomez or the video journalist Mario Sepúlveda, serve as remarkable inspirations of what is possible. These ordinary men surely exemplify the servant leader Robert Greenleaf depicts in this book Servant Leadership.

They say it takes a village to raise a child. Obviously, the whole world engaged to ‘raise’ these miners. These miners, their families and those in charge of the rescue efforts managed to create a global village, even for a short while. What a demonstration of community building!

I’m grateful to the miners, their families and all involved in the rescue. They inspire me to sharpen my focus and commitment to priorities while stepping up to the challenges that challenges that servant leadership requires of me. I believe the image of the rescue capsule ‘Fénix ’ will serve as an apt and poignant visual reminder.

What’s your take on this extraordinary event? Why do you believe a billion people resonated so deeply with the unfolding events and the rescue? What insights are you taking away from this experience?