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NEWS & LETTERS, April - May 2007Cutting corners cost Sego miners’ livesDetroit--Reports of state and federal mine inspectors reveal that hundreds, if not thousands, of mine block stoppings, or seals, are deficient. The inspections were ordered after last year’s Sego mine disaster in West Virginia, which killed 12 miners, and the subsequent Kentucky Darby mine explosion that blasted five miners to death, both disclosed block stopping failures. The circulation of air in the nation’s underground coal mines is of critical importance, not only because of the oxygen the miners need to breathe, but also to drive off explosive methane gas that is released in the mining process. This is accomplished by driving air shafts down into the mine and installing huge air fans at the shaft opening to draw air through the mine from the outside. Inside the mine, the air is directed by concrete blocks that are laid from top to bottom and from side to side, with each block firmly mortared to create airtight seals that are installed along both sides of the mine working areas. On the intake side, the air is drawn in from the outside and directed to the working areas to drive out the methane gas and is expelled through the opposite air return side. What you have in effect are two parallel air tunnels, the intake and the return. The integrity of these air-directing block stoppings is obviously of great importance to the miners’ safety. Much care goes into putting up a block stopping, and I worked for months with a stopping crew in the mine. The seal crew members all took their work very seriously and were very skilled workers. They could easily qualify as professional block layers, and were always in demand by building contractors. The inspection reports noted that mine owners have been using “alternative" materials, which were cheaper and lighter, rather than standard concrete blocks. An evaluation of the construction and material integrity of the seals is underway, and mine owners must submit information requested by the Mine Safety and Health Administration and receive its approval on seals. Since the Bush administration has decimated the number of safety inspectors, huge bottlenecks are delaying the processing of the reports, which infuriates the mine owners. The Bush administration has responded by giving “provisional approval" to plans before they get all of the information they need to grant formal approval. There are reported to be 14,000 “alternative seals" in mines, and many of them don’t have any mortar at all to seal them. Of the 96 plans submitted by the coal operators, only 54 have been reviewed, and only one plan has been fully approved. In the meantime, the thousands of underground miners who go to work every day are risking their lives needlessly because of the failures of both the MSHA and the coal operators who have always given top priority to coal production rather than miners’ safety. --Andy Phillips |
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