It was early August when Andrew Schmitt got the call from his company’s partners in Chile requesting help in a mission the likes of which he’d never seen in all his years in the drilling business. Partners of Mission Woods-based Layne Christensen Co. (Nasdaq: LAYN), of which Schmitt is CEO, had been helping search for miners who were trapped underground when a mine collapsed on Aug. 5. But they were about to get much more involved. Upon finding 33 miners alive, the Chilean government had publicly announced a so-called Plan A that could have the miners out by around the...