Mine Executive Testifies to Senators

Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship  defended his company’s safety record to a Senate subcommittee last week. Massey Energy owns the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, in which 29 coal miners lost their lives in an explosion in April.

This Senate subcommittee, which oversees spending on mine safety agencies, is investigating allegations that Massey had thumbed its nose at federal mine safety regulations. Workplace safety is a critical issue for people suffering asbestos-related diseases, such as mesothelioma. Most of today’s mesothelioma patients were exposed to asbestos on the job, and much of this exposure took place after the dangers of asbestos were well known to medical science. The fact is, lots of businesses won’t left a finger to protect employees until they are compelled by government to do so.

And sometimes, not even then.

After the April explosion, news stories revealed that the Upper Big Branch mine had amassed more than 1,100 violations in the past three years, many of them serious. In March 2010 alone the mine had been charged with 50 violations, including improper ventilation of methane gas. The April explosion appears to have been caused by an accumulation of methane.

CEO Blankenship told the senators he is committed to workplace safety. “Massey does not place profits over safety,” Blankenship said. “We never have and we never will.”

However, West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd wasn’t buying it. “I cannot fathom how an American business could practice such disgraceful health and safety policies while at the same time boasting about its commitment to the safety of workers,” Byrd said.

Blankenship strongly hinted that the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) was the real culprit in the mine disaster. His company had complied with MSHA’s orders to change the ventilation system, Blankenship said, even though Massey engineers told him MSHA’s system wasn’t safe. He accused MSHA of conducting secret investigations so it could bury its own wrongdoing.

MSHA has been criticized by industry and labor alike for holding parts of its Upper Big Branch mine investigations behind closed door. Spokespeople for MSHA say that release of some information now might harm ongoing criminal investigations. They also said MSHA doesn’t design ventilation systems.

Blankenship wasn’t the only manager answering to the senate subcommittee. Joe Main, director of the MSHA, told the senators his agency needed more subpoena power to conduct investigations and more authority to compel compliance.

Along with taking flak for the secret investigations, MSHA has been criticized for not getting tough enough on reckless mining practices.  MSHA says companies like Massey Energy clog the system with endless legal challenges of safety violations.

Meanwhile, some miners have stepped forward to say the mine wasn’t safe. One said the mine was a “ticking time bomb,” and that supervisors never complied with inspector’s instructions to fix the ventilation system. “They would fix it just good enough to get us to load coal again,” he said.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 24th, 2010 at 2:29 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.