Report Says Crandall Canyon Managers Should Face Charges

by James Parks, May 8, 2008

The mine manager and other senior staff at the Crandall Canyon coal mine in Utah hid information from federal mining officials that could have prevented the disaster and should face criminal charges, a congressional committee said today. Last August, six miners and three rescue workers died after the mine collapsed. 

In a report released today, the House Education and Labor Committee says the mining company’s plan to remove coal was flawed and should never have been submitted, and that the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) should never have approved it. (See video.)

The committee referred its findings to the U.S. Department of Justice for possible criminal prosecutions. Click here to read a summary of the report by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), the committee chair.

In a statement, Mine Workers President Cecil Roberts urged the Justice Department “to fully and completely investigate these matters, without regard to where that investigation may lead.” 

Yet for all the analyses, all the insights and all the investigations, the fact remains that nine miners are dead today who should not be. Family members have wept and been left inconsolable. Wives, parents and children are without husbands, sons and fathers. Our nation and its leaders can no longer watch these tragedies unfold, wring our hands and say, ‘How horrible,’ then stand aside and do little to prevent them. 

This is the third report faulting the mining company and federal officials for the disaster last August. The U.S. Department of Labor’s inspector general found that MSHA was “negligent” when it approved the mining plan.

Two months ago, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee reported that MSHA failed to protect the Crandall Canyon miners by “rubber-stamping” a dangerous mining plan.

Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), the committee chairman, also called for a criminal investigation into the disaster.  Kennedy said the mine’s owners showed

callous disregard for the law and for safety standards, and hardworking miners lost their lives.

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Tags: mine safety, Crandall Canyon, Mine Safety and Health Administration, MSHA, Mine Workers, Cecil Roberts, George Miller, Edward Kennedy, union, unions, labor, union blogs Channels: Legislation & Politics

2 Comments

1. BobS on 09.05.2008 at 09:25 (Reply)

   There’s blood on the coal and money in the bank. But justice is still nowhere to be found.

   In biology class I learned that carbon is the element that gives us life. It’s unique ability to chain with other elements into wondrously complex arrays is why we are here today.

   Yet after reading this it’s was hard to think of carbon as the element of life. There were simply too many deaths resulting from our mad addiction to the carbon that lies buried in the ground.

   And the people who walk away with the riches from Number 6 on the Periodic Table? I would guess that none of them were the ones entombed deep under the earth.

   Oh…they do venture out of their air conditioned offices to mingle with the media or with anxious families, but it’s an empty ritual. Everyone knows it is scripted and directed by skillful PR firms with the object of soothing our grief and anger…and then turning those into dark despair and pitiful powerlessness.

   In the mid 20th century a shaggy rock group called the Fugs used to sing a song called ‘Kill for Peace.” I’m waiting for their successors to pen an update, “Kill for Carbon”.

   The element of life? Yeah, right………

   Bob Simpson
   The BobboSphere

2. Rich A. on 10.05.2008 at 10:46 (Reply)

   Only when owners/CEOs are held criminally responsible will we see change.

   We mourn the loss of all workers.

   When I see soft-handed, coiffed and manicured, well cared-for politicians recite things like “the Peru Free Trade Agreement [or any FTA] is ok because it contains labor and environmental standards” I want to puke. Labor and environmental standards are not being enforced right here in the US! How in the world will they be enforced in a foreign country? The answer is they won’t. All that crap is just words on paper.

   Workers in the US need to start walking out of, and thereby sutting down, whole industries until safety is achieved.

   Same thing for national, single-payer health care. Both are life and death issues.

   Unless we have the courage to move the suits and ties aside, more workers will die on unsafe worksites, and more working class people will perish for want of life saving medical care.

   Ultimately, it is up to us. A few words by poet Robert W. Service sums it up: “Oh, it will be the end, mother, when lads like him and me, That sweat to feed the ones above, decide that we’ll be free. . . .”