NEWS & LETTERS, May-June 2010
For mine bosses, 29 dead just the cost of digging coal
Detroit--Following the explosion that killed 29 miners at the Upper Big Branch Massey mine in Montcoal, W.Va., declarations from the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), coal company officials and even President Obama will not amount to what is truly needed. The cause of this explosion lies directly at the feet of Massey CEO Don Blankenship. He has always been rabidly anti-union.
As a Massey mine manager since 1982, he played a leading role in the Massey mine strike in 1985 that lasted 13 months. It led to breaking the UMWA there the following year (see N&L, Aug.-Sept. 1985, Oct. 1985 and Jan.-Feb. 1986), in part due to the capitulation of then-UMWA President Rich Trumka, now head of the AFL-CIO.
REIGN OF TERROR
Blankenship instituted a reign of terror in the 15 Massey mine communities in West Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania, traveling around in a black Mercedes and a black helicopter to enhance his ominous presence. If any miner expressed sympathy for a union, objected to unsafe conditions or criticized Blankenship, that miner was fired on the spot.
Following the mine explosion, Montcoal residents refused to give their names to reporters--they knew that Blankenship would fire any relative or family member who could be connected with them. But the real attitude of the community was dramatically revealed when Blankenship, escorted by at least a dozen police officers, appeared after the explosion at a meeting. He had to be rushed away immediately from the angry crowd that yelled profanities at him and cursed him for putting profits above the lives of the miners.
Blankenship is first and foremost for profits, profits, profits. He opposes regulations, unions, environmentalists, fringe benefits, inspections and anyone or anything that disagrees with him. He is for Republicans, Tea Parties, Chambers of Commerce, organizations that attack unions, strict obedience by his employees and their families, reductions in pay and benefits, mountain-top removal mining, corrupt judges and other officials and absolute dictatorial control.
Along the way he has accumulated hundreds of environmental violations related to his mining operations, including the poisoning of water even in the community in which he lives.
Reporters discovered a memo that Blankenship had sent to Massey mine superintendents ordering them to ignore safety concerns: "If any of you have been asked by your group presidents, your supervisors, engineers or anyone else to do anything other than to run coal…you need to ignore them and run coal."
This same attitude is reflected in the horrendous safety record at the Upper Big Branch mine, which racked up 458 mine safety violations last year (53 in March alone), many involving ventilation and explosive methane gas and coal dust accumulation, all of which are prime suspects in the mine explosion. Many working sections in the mine had to be evacuated last year.
The explosion itself was probably methane gas that set off a coal dust explosion, because a methane explosion is not as powerful as coal dust, and miners said that the blast twisted steel rails like pretzels, which a methane explosion by itself could not do. But every explosion is preventable with proper safety measures.
The system of fines for serious violations is farcical in practice because of lack of enforcement and big loopholes in the law. For example, last year Massey appealed 37 of 50 citations, which delays actions by MSHA and allows coal companies to continue to work under dangerous conditions during the settlement process.
It isn't only Massey; other coal companies have followed suit. The over 18,000 appeals now underway clog the process and will take years to resolve. Fines at Upper Big Branch last year totaled nearly $900,000, of which only $168,000 or so has been paid.
I worked in a union mine and served on the safety committee for years. I know the difference in the attitude of miners in a union and non-union mine. We checked the mine frequently, noting all violations and getting pledges from management to correct them, and followed up on all of them. We did not fear management. Management feared us because we had a strong local union and had international union support.
At the Upper Big Branch mine it was the opposite. Workers were at the mercy of the criminal Blankenship, and feared him. While the miners were paid well, they had no fringe benefits and often were forced to work 12 or more hours a day. They had to fill the coal production quota before they could leave the mine.
REAL CHANGE
What will happen now? There will be Congressional hearings, and the coal operators and Blankenship will be told what bad boys they are for allowing such conditions to exist. Some loopholes will be closed, more mine investigators will be hired, stricter enforcement rules will be made. But nothing serious will change. The coal industry has over 100 highly paid lobbyists in Washington, D.C. They are now working overtime to make sure that whatever laws are enacted will have loopholes for the coal operators to slime through and more miners will needlessly die.
The only real solution lies with the miners controlling not only the safety in the mines, but also the mines. This, of course, will not happen under the present system. But it remains the only alternative that can realistically answer the problems that miners face and can result in truly declaring: It will never happen again.
--Andy Phillips
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