Rescuers find bodies of two W.Va.,miners (AP) Updated: 2006-01-22 08:52
Rescuers on Saturday found the bodies of two miners who disappeared after a
conveyor belt caught fire deep inside a coal mine, bringing to 14 the number of
West Virginia miners killed on the job in less than a month.
The bodies
were found in an area of the mine where rescue teams had been battling the
intense blaze for more than 40 hours. Rescuers could not enter that portion of
the mine until the flames had been mostly extinguished and the tunnels cooled
down.
![](xin_03010322085594131111.jpg) Mourners exit the Bright Star Freewill Baptist
Church in Melville, W.Va., Saturday, Jan. 21, 2006, near the Alma No. 1
mine where two miners have been missing since Thursday in Melville,
W.Va.[AP photo]
| "We have found the two
miners we were looking for," said Doug Conaway, director of the state Office of
Miners' Health Training and Safety. "Unfortunately, we don't have a positive
outcome."
The miners became separated Thursday evening as their 12-member crew tried to
escape a conveyor belt fire at Aracoma Coal's Alma No. 1 mine in Melville, about
60 miles southwest of Charleston. The rest of the crew and nine other miners
working in a different section of the mine escaped unharmed.
Gov. Joe Manchin and Sen. Jay Rockefeller informed families of the deaths at
a church before announcing them publicly, along with Don Blankenship, chairman
of Aracoma's owner, Massey Energy.
"We have two brave miners that have perished," the governor told reporters.
Conaway said it appeared the two miners made a "valiant effort" to escape,
but were blocked by high temperatures and thick smoke.
Saturday's deaths bring to 14 the number of West Virginia miners killed on
the job since Jan. 2. Earlier this month, 12 miners died as a result of an
explosion at the Sago Mine, more than 180 miles away on the northern side of the
state. The sole survivor of that accident remained hospitalized in a light coma
Saturday.
The governor pledged to introduce legislation Monday dealing with rapid
responses in emergencies, electronic tracking technology and reserve oxygen
stations for underground miners. He planned to travel to Washington on Tuesday
to discuss the proposals with the state's congressional delegation.
"These two men who perished in this mine, the 12 men who perished in the Sago
Mine, I can only say to each of those families ... that they have not died in
vain," Manchin said.
Rep. Nick Rahall (news, bio, voting record), D-W.Va., said Congress must give
the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration the tools to operate
effectively, and may have to increase its budget.
"It's unfortunate that every coal mine health and safety law on the books is
written with the blood of coal miners," Rahall said.
The federal Mine Health and Safety Act was written a year after a 1968
explosion in Farmington that killed 78 miners, including Manchin's uncle.
Rescue workers on the surface of the Aracoma mine got no response Saturday
morning when they drilled a 200-foot hole into a mine shaft in an effort to
contact the missing miners. Workers pounded on a steel drill bit but heard
nothing from below, and a camera and a microphone lowered into the hole detected
no sign of them.
Rescue efforts were hampered by intense heat and smoke that cut visibility to
2 to 3 feet in some parts of the mine. Teams were able to get into four tunnels,
each about four miles long, but they could not get beyond the burning conveyor
belt. Heat from the fire had also caused the roof of the mine to deteriorate.
The victims were identified as Don I. Bragg, 33, and Ellery Hatfield, 47.
Both were husbands and fathers with more than a decade of mining experience and
had worked in the Alma mine for five years.
"It's just rough. He's really going to be missed," said Kevin Walls, a nephew
of Hatfield's. "He was just a good man. He would do anything to help anybody."
The two men had been equipped with oxygen canisters that typically produce
about an hour's worth of air.
Jimmy Marcum, a 54-year-old retired miner from Delbarton, said better
equipment is needed to protect miners.
"I mean, they can send a man to the moon but they can't make a (oxygen
canister) that will last at least 16 hours. ... That's what they need to do,"
Marcum said.
Officials emphasized that there were key differences between the Alma mine
fire and the Jan 2. Sago mine explosion. For one, the carbon monoxide levels,
while still higher than normal in the Alma mine, were not as severe, Conaway
said.
Also, the ventilation system continued to work at the Alma mine and no
methane was detected coming out, said Robert Friend, acting deputy assistant
secretary for MSHA.
That enabled rescuers to get into the mine more quickly. The gases at the
Sago Mine and damage to the ventilation system had prevented investigators from
entering the mine until Saturday. It will likely be another week before they can
reach the deepest parts of the mine and begin the physical investigation into
what caused the explosion, said Ben Hatfield, president of International Coal
Group, which owns Sago.
Conveyor belt fires can occur when belt rollers get stuck or out of alignment
and rub against the structure supporting them, said John Langton, MSHA's deputy
administrator for coal mine safety and health. Another possible cause is the
accumulation of coal dust.
An MSHA proposal in the early 1990s would have required more vigorous testing
of fire resistancy of conveyor belts. But it was shelved in 2002.
The agency proposed the change after a study showed that conveyor belts
sparked 53 coal mine fires between 1970 and 1988, with 36 of them occurring in
the 1980s.
Langton said officials felt comfortable withdrawing the proposal because of
improved sensors that can detect smoke and carbon monoxide. The monitoring
system worked Thursday, he said.
The Aracoma mine received more than 90 citations from MSHA in 2005. According
to the MSHA Web site, the most recent were issued Dec. 20, when the mine was hit
with seven violations for problems related to its ventilation plan and efforts
to control coal dust and other combustible materials.
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