Owners profit as mine accidents rise

On July 7, construction worker Ed Fitzgerrel died from several blunt traumas to the head. He was trapped between a mechanical lift and a steel structure while working on a mine in Hopkins County, Kentucky. Fitzgerrel was the 50^th worker to die in a mine accident this year. In all of 2005, 57 workers died in mine accidents.

Two U.S. coal mine disasters became international news in recent months. An explosion at the West Virginia Sago

Mine in January trapped and killed 12 miners. In May, an explosion at the Darby Mine in Kentucky killed five miners.

Miners ran out of oxygen before they could be rescued in both disasters. Relatives of miners who died in the Sago mine tragedy correctly blamed the multinational corporation that owns the mine, International Coal Group. Randal McCloy Jr., the only survivor of the Sago mine disaster, said that four of the miners’ emergency air packs malfunctioned. Yet, the Bush administration has claimed that all air packs tested at the Sago and Darby mines were fully functioning.

When mine accidents happen, workers can be trapped for days. Functioning supplies of oxygen are crucial for survival. Both the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and the Mine Safety and Health Administration have found that air packs don’t help miners breathe, especially when they’ve rattled around in the dust, dirt and moisture of an underground coal mine. And the air packs only carry a one hour supply of oxygen.

On June 15, in response to the mine tragedies and the outrage of workers, President Bush signed into law the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act. But the law offers few improvements in safety standards. It only requires that air packs carry two hours of oxygen. An amendment to the bill that would have required mines to provide two-day oxygen supplies for every worker was defeated.

Mine work made worse by corporate greed

Miners work is extremely dangerous. According to the Mine Safety and Health Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor, over 128,000 workers have died in U.S. mines since 1900. 

Miners often work in confined spaces miles underground. The air in these underground tunnels is filled with noxious and explosives gasses and requires constant ventilation. Explosions, fires, rock falls and other hazards are a constant worry. Explosions often trap miners and fill the enclosed spaces with poisonous carbon monoxide.

U.S. coal production has greatly increased since president Bush took office. The price of coal has risen from $28 a ton in 2001 to around $42 a ton now. In the last three years, coal owners have opened roughly 100 new mines. Profits have increase hundreds of times over.

In the scramble for profits, mine owners have cast safety aside. They’ve been assisted in this by their executives in Congress and the White House. Under the Bush administration, enforcement of mine safety regulations has greatly decreased. President Bush even sought to rename mine inspectors as “Compliance Assistance Specialists” to deflect attention from safety issues. But the workers rejected this name change and the Bush administration was forced to keep the title.

The government also keeps fines for violations of security regulations so low that mine owners hardly feel any pain. Last year, a whopping 13,000 fines were issued against West Virginia mine owners. But the total amount of the fines was a meager $2 million. Meanwhile, mining giant International Coal Group made $31 million in profits in 2005. The mining industry in West Virginia produces $3.5 billion in coal every year.

The lack of enforcement and puny fines is driven by the government’s willingness to cast safety aside—framing it as an “issue of the past”—in order to allow monopoly capitalists to reap greater profits. But mine safety problems haven’t disappeared, and mine workers know this too well.

Mine safety can be won through struggle 

Mine barons accumulated their vast wealth by exploiting adult workers and children and by shrugging off the hundreds of miners who died in individual mine accidents. These conditions have always been met by fierce resistance from mine workers. The history of mine workers in the U.S. is one of pitched-battles against the mine bosses. They have organized strong unions and won many victories in wages, benefits, and safety regulations through militant struggle.

As the big mining corporations continue the race to increase profits, many more miners will be needlessly injured and die. Now, as before, the mine owners won’t change their ways without a fight. Dennis O’Dell of the United Mine Workers of America acknowledged this reality in the May 28, 2006 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “The coal industry is like it was in the 1920s. They’re not going to make the mines clean and safe unless someone makes them do it.” A powerful, organized workers’ movement that targets the mine owners and their partners in Washington can accomplish this goal.