Beaconsfield miner Brant Webb shares shock revelation about his relationship with fellow survivor Todd Russell

Beaconsfield mine survivor Brant Webb has revealed a shock confession that the public’s view of him and his relationship with Todd Russell may be far from reality.

Russell, who died from cancer this week aged 54, was trapped with Webb for 14 days when a small earthquake triggered a rockfall just north of Launceston in Tasmania.

Footage of the pair emerging alive and triumphant at the surface made headlines around the world.

Following Russell’s death, Webb praised his colleague’s fighting spirit and shared how “he did so much for the community” after they were freed.

But in a brutally honest new interview, Webb conceded the pair shared a complicated relationship.

Webb told McKnight Tonight he felt like he had been “keeping a secret for a bloke that didn’t respect me”.

“The only thing we had in common was we stayed in a hole for two weeks together,” he told Robert McKnight.

“Todd was Todd, you know. Even when we did the book, his mother said he was the most arrogant person she ever met.”

When asked if he liked the man he is forever linked with by the disaster, Webb said: “No, not really.”

“(Russell) had his good things like we all do. He probably would say the same about me,” Webb said.

“Him and I didn’t sort of see eye-to-eye on a lot of things. That’s life. You can’t like everybody, not everyone likes you.

“We had a good time ... for the first couple of years. We did a lot.”

The pair had ‘different views on life’

Russell, who was caught up in the disaster after taking an overtime shift, said he and Webb did not really know each other before the gold mine rockfall that trapped them on Anzac Day, 2006.

After they were saved, the pair launched the Russell-Webb Legacy Foundation to support disadvantaged children, and they also raised money for rescue services.

Webb said that despite their differences the pair “didn’t hate each other”.

“We had different views of life and what we were doing and where we’re going,” he said.

‘Everything was stripped out before we got it’

Webb also McKnight the pair was paid a tiny cut of the rumoured $2.6 million exclusive television deal they signed to tell their story.

“We didn’t get nowhere near that,” he said, adding, “everything was stripped out before we got it”.

And Webb claimed the pair were actually trapped three days longer than they should have been because of issues with an explosives expert.

Webb is in talks for a new book about life after Beaconsfield, and is planning to resurrect the foundation he and Russell co-founded.

A limited edition brew called the Great Escape was created to support the relaunch in December.