11 out of 12 of miners died, one alive is critical

[BERIGAN]

Fuck....just fuck............. I feel asleep for a few hours thinking only one miner had died, then saw it was the other way around.

Only 1 W. Virginia coal miner now said found alive

Wed Jan 4, 2006 3:04 AM ET

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TALLMANSVILLE, West Virginia (Reuters) - Only one of 13 miners who were in a West Virginia coal mine when it was hit by an explosion was found alive, a company official told family members on Wednesday, after reports hours earlier that 12 had survived led to rejoicing.

Virginia Dean, whose uncle was in the mine, said, "Only one lived. They lied."

Edited January 4, 2006 by BERIGAN

[BERIGAN]

edit.... funny headline, not so funny right now....

Edited January 4, 2006 by BERIGAN

[RDK]

On CNN now. Wow - amazing news! Did anyone expect them to still be alive?

[Tjazz]

Huh?

Ya got me to flip the TV on again.

[Spontooneous]

The newspaper I work for has just printed hundreds of thousands of copies that say "Miners Found Alive." Many of them are in people's yards already. And now this reversal. All in a span of a little over three hours.

[Rooster_Ties]

The newspaper I work for has just printed hundreds of thousands of copies that say "Miners Found Alive." Many of them are in people's yards already. And now this reversal. All in a span of a little over three hours.

I remember late last night thinking it was a little weird that CNN.com was saying that the families were saying that all the miners were found alive. ("according to families of the miners") Even said so in the "headline/link" on the front page of CNN's website. Didn't think too much of it at the time, but it did seem odd. Now we know.

[Alexander]

Yeah, my local paper is carrying the headline that 12 miners are alive and that one died. Aside from the fact that this situation is terribly sad for the families of the miners, it's also a big black eye for the print media (which can't update and/or retract a story once it's "out there"). It's certainly a hell of a lot worse than "Dewey Defeats Truman."

[Brad]

How could a mistake like that be made. It's very terrible. There's no way you'd ever get me to go down there.

[Spontooneous]

Wasn't just the families saying they were alive. The governor of West Virginia announced it -- a fact he seems to be conveniently ignoring today.

[Rooster_Ties]

Jan. 04, 2006 - 1:59 PM

Misreporting a Catastrophe

How the Press Got the Sago Story Wrong

Gal Beckerman

Maybe the reporters on the ground in West Virginia were just plain tired. Or maybe they themselves were swept up in the euphoria and wanted to believe. Otherwise, it's hard to explain how the erroneous news of the survival and rescue of 12 of the 13 miners caught underneath the ground in Sago, West Virginia made it to the front pages of our nation's papers this morning.

A close reading of the articles themselves tells the tale of how journalists bungled the story: In most, there are no sources at all for the information; in some, the sources are the rumors spread by frantic family members. Those sorts of sources are hardly a solid basis for headlines screaming, "They're Alive!"

Take a look at how the venerable Washington Post began its story: "A dozen miners trapped 12,000 feet into a mountainside since early Monday were found alive Tuesday night just hours after rescuers found the body of a 13th man, who died in an explosion in an adjacent coal mine that was sealed off in early December."

The article continues in full speculation mode, adding in the fourth paragraph that "the miners had apparently done what they had been taught to do: barricaded themselves in a pocket with breathable air and awaited rescue."

All untrue -- but written with stunning confidence. Nowhere in this Post piece is there any mention of sources. It doesn't even refer to the one official, Joe Thornton, deputy secretary for the West Virginia Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety, who was widely quoted and whom the New York Times at least referred to in its lead: "Forty-one hours after an explosion trapped 13 men in a West Virginia coal mine here, family members and a state official said 12 of the miners had been found alive Tuesday night."

In updated online versions today, both the Times and the Post tried to trace how the confusion arose. It sounded like a bad game of "telephone." Apparently, according to Bennett K. Hatfield, chief executive officer of International Coal Group, the mine's owner, the command center misunderstood a phone call from the rescuers in the mine shaft. Hatfield then admitted today at a news conference that he suppressed the news from a second phone call that made it clear that the first had been incorrect.

Certainly, the decision not to immediately correct the rumors helped the story leap to the front pages. But what is equally obvious is that reporters at the scene did not do enough to verify the truth of what they were being told by happy family members. They then produced articles, like the Post's and USA Today's, that almost unbelievably failed to offer any sources.

What we might have expected, and what could have perhaps mitigated some of the damage, is an explanation in papers' online editions (and presumably tomorrow's print versions) of the mistakes that reporters and editors made that led them to get the story so wrong. Where were journalists getting their information from? Why did they choose to believe it? How could they possibly write about miners being on their way to the hospital without confirming it? But, so far, no mirror has been held up.

And yet the most frightening aspect of this incident is what it suggests about how reporters normally function in a high-pressure crisis situation. Do they always rely on such poorly-sourced information?

Suppose, for a moment, the miners had actually been rescued. No one would have ever questioned the reporting. But journalists would have been correct by dint of pure luck -- not because of solid information.

The old cliché says that it's better to be lucky than good. In this case, the press was neither.

Edited January 4, 2006 by Rooster_Ties

[Spontooneous]

Beckerman doesn't mention the role that a governor eager to be seen in a happy photo op and eager to be quoted about a "miracle" in the world press played in confirming the wrong information.

In fact, we held off on printing the information when it was sourced to the families. We didn't run with it until after the governor confirmed it.

EDIT: Out paper ran an unscheduled third edition to get the story straight. About 40,000 papers had the news right. (That's out of about 200,000.)

Edited January 4, 2006 by Spontooneous

[Johnny E]

Those poor men. What a way to go? Their families must be traumatized. Not only by their lose, but by the emotional roller coaster they've been subjected to over the past few days. Sad, very sad.

[Rooster_Ties]

EDIT: Out paper ran an unscheduled third edition to get the story straight. About 40,000 papers had the news right. (That's out of about 200,000.)

So, out of curiosity, where'd the third edition end up going?? Lawns?? Or (more likely is my guess), for news-paper boxes and grocery-store check-out lane sales and such??

How rare is it to run a third edition, Spontoon?? - if you don't mind me askin'. (And I can't imagine you've ever run a fourth edition, right?)

[Spontooneous]

The late, late edition was thrown on lawns, in a pattern I don't understand. My parents got one. A co-worker who lives about five blocks from them got one. Another co-worker who lives three blocks from that first co-worker didn't. I didn't.

Apparently nobody thought to print extras for machines, convenience stores, etc.

We're still (right now) getting calls from people demanding a "corrected" paper. They're out of luck.

A third edition is extremely unusual. We haven't gone that late on anything since the last presidential election. The time before that was the election of 2000.

Here's the most remarkable thing about last night: When the corrected edition was ready, only about 14,000 papers remained in the press run. And 20,000-plus erroneous papers were on the loading dock. This cost-cutting company, which complains about the escalating cost of paper, consented to pulp those 20,000-plus papers and print new ones to replace them. That'll probably never happen again.

[Rooster_Ties]

FWIW, Spontoon, the copy thrown at our house had the "they're all alive" version of the story.

Even if The Star got the story wrong, at least you held on the story until the governor made his (it turns out) boneheaded statement -- and only went with it based on that. IMHO, the Star's role in this is pretty defensible.

[Christiern]

EDITORIAL

January 5, 2006

The Sago Mine Disaster

I

n the long history of coal mine tragedies in Appalachia, few have borne the compound misery suffered in Sago, W.Va., where a dozen families were plunged from exultation to furious grief by a false report that their loved ones had survived a deadly mine explosion on Monday. After realizing the calamitous mistake, mining company officials took three hours to confirm the error and tell the truth to the dead miners' families, further devastating the community.

Survivors are left with the apology of the company officials and rescuers who eagerly rushed the false word forth. But government investigators must waste no time in ascertaining the actual cause of the blast, for the Sago mine was already notorious for its long list of safety violations and fines.

The mine, with more than 270 safety citations in the last two years, is the latest example of how workers' risks are balanced against company profits in an industry with pervasive political clout and patronage inroads in government regulatory agencies. Many of the Sago citations were serious enough to potentially set off accidental explosions and shaft collapses, and more than a dozen involved violations that mine operators knew about but failed to correct, according to government records.

Sadly, in the way mines are often run, the $24,000 in fines paid by the Sago managers last year constituted little more than the cost of doing business. In the Appalachian routine, miners balking at risky conditions down below can quickly forfeit their livelihood if they have no union protection.

Political figures from both parties have long defended and profited from ties to the coal industry. Whether or not that was a factor in the Sago mine's history, the Bush administration's cramming of important posts in the Department of the Interior with biased operatives from the coal, oil and gas industry is not reassuring about general safety in the mines. Steven Griles, a mining lobbyist before being appointed deputy secretary of the interior, devoted four years to rolling back mine regulations and then went back to lobbying for the industry.

Just as Hurricane Katrina forced Americans to look at the face of lingering poverty and racism, this mining tragedy should focus us all on another forgotten, mistreated corner of society. The Sago mine disaster is far more than a story of cruel miscommunication. The dozen dead miners deserve to be memorialized with fresh scrutiny of the state of mine safety regulation and a resurrection of political leadership willing to look beyond Big Coal to the interests of those who risk their lives in the mines.

[Brownian Motion]

Come all you young fellows so young and so fine

And seek not your fortune in the dark dreary mine

It will form like a habit and seep in your soul

Till the stream of your blood runs as black as the coal

Chorus

Where it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew

Where the danger is doubled and the pleasures are few

Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines

It's dark as a dungeon way down in the mine

There's many a man I've seen in my day

Who lived just to labor his whole life away

Like a fiend with his dope and a drunkard his wine

A man will have lust for the lure of the mine

[chorus]

Oh when I am dead and the ages shall roll

My body will blacken and turn into coal

Then I'll look from the door of my heavenly home

And pity the miner a-digging my bones

[Chorus]

Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines

It's dark as a dungeon way down in the mine

-Merle Travis

Edited January 5, 2006 by Brownian Motion

[patricia]

='Christiern'

Just as Hurricane Katrina forced Americans to look at the face of lingering poverty and racism, this mining tragedy should focus us all on another forgotten, mistreated corner of society. The Sago mine disaster is far more than a story of cruel miscommunication. The dozen dead miners deserve to be memorialized with fresh scrutiny of the state of mine safety regulation and a resurrection of political leadership willing to look beyond Big Coal to the interests of those who risk their lives in the mines.

But, sadly, just as Katrina is fading into the past, so will the unsafe working conditions for miners fade into the past. The focus of the news reports has lingered on the reporting that all the miners except one were alive, which turned out not to be true, rather than the more important safety issues, long-standing.

Most seem content to shake their heads, murmering "Ain't it awful?" and go on with their lives, until the next horrible occurrance, which they will deal with in the same sympathetic, but impotent way.

[BERIGAN]

Do NOT get me wrong, we need to take all steps necessary to make it as safe as humanly possible for miners here, but check out what has happened in China in the last year!!!!

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=...34045720218B255

Edited January 8, 2006 by BERIGAN

[Brownian Motion]

Do NOT get me wrong, we need to take all steps necessary to make it as safe as humanly possible for miners here, but check out what has happened in China in the last year!!!!

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=...34045720218B255

We kill our niners more slowly here.

Safety Violations Have Piled Up at Coal Mine

By Joby Warrick

Washington Post Staff Writer

Wednesday, January 4, 2006; A04

Time and again over the past four years, federal mining inspectors documented the same litany of problems at central West Virginia's Sago Mine: mine roofs that tended to collapse without warning. Faulty or inadequate tunnel supports. A dangerous buildup of flammable coal dust.

Yesterday, the mine's safety record came into sharp focus as officials searched for explanations to Monday's underground explosion. That record, as reflected in dozens of federal inspection reports, shows a succession of operators struggling to overcome serious, long-standing safety problems, some of which could be part of the investigation into the cause of the explosion that trapped 13 miners.

In the past two years, the mine was cited 273 times for safety violations, of which about a third were classified as "significant and substantial," according to documents compiled by the Labor Department's Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA). Many were for problems that could contribute to accidental explosions or the collapse of mine tunnels, records show.

In addition, 16 violations logged in the past eight months were listed as "unwarrantable failures," a designation reserved for serious safety infractions for which the operator had either already been warned, or which showed "indifference or extreme lack of care," said Tony Oppegard, a former counsel to MSHA.

"That is a very high number, and it is usually indicative of a very poor safety record," Oppegard said.

Sago, a relatively small mine that listed 145 employees last year, was operated by Anker West Virginia Mining Co. until two months ago, when it was purchased by International Coal Group Inc. "Much of the bad history you're talking about was beyond our reach and ability to control," company chief executive Bennett K. Hatfield said yesterday. "But there's been dramatic improvement, and I think regulatory agencies will confirm that."

In the hours after Monday's explosion, Eugene Kitts, a company vice president for mining, said the 46 alleged violations described in MSHA's most recent inspection report were all minor. "We addressed them," he said.

But in MSHA's reports, 18 of the 46 most recent violations were listed as "significant and substantial." Among the problems cited: inadequate safeguards against the collapse of the mine roof and inadequate ventilation to guard against the buildup of deadly gases.

Other inspection reports over the past two years fault the mine for "combustibles," including a buildup of flammable coal dust and a failure to adequately insulate electric wires. Sparks from electrical equipment can ignite coal dust and methane gas, triggering fires and explosions.

The mine is contesting some of the violations, while agreeing to pay more than $24,000 in penalties to settle others.

Government documents also show a high rate of injuries and accidents at Sago. Although no miners were reported killed at the mine since at least 1995, 42 workers and contractors were injured in accidents since 2000, records show. The average number of working days lost because of accidents in the past five years was nearly double the national average for underground coal mines, MSHA documents show.

Some serious accidents caused no injuries. For example, in the past year, large sections of the mine's rocky roof collapsed on at least 20 occasions -- but not when workers were in the affected tunnels. Some of the collapsed sections were rocky slabs of up to 100 feet long. The most recent roof collapse occurred on Dec. 5, less than a month before Monday's explosion.

J. Davitt McAteer, who headed MSHA during the Clinton administration, said he was troubled by an apparent spike in accidents and violations that occurred beginning about two years ago.

"The violations are not the worst I've ever seen -- and certainly not the best -- but I'm am concerned about the trend and the direction they're going in. It's indication to those running the operation that you've got a problem here."

Staff writer Ann Scott Tyson in Tallmansville, W.Va., contributed to this report.

[patricia]

Thank you Brownian Motion. That's, I think, the bigger story, which I hope won't be lost in the shuffle. Although we all hope that the lone survivor recovers, the safety of the mine, to which all the workers intend to return, gets it's shit together and addresses the problems, long standing, before this happens again, and again.......

Although it's true that China's mines are worse, that's not the standard which should be applied, IMO.

Injuries and deaths should not be the cost of doing business.

It seems to me that I heard President Bush touting the virtues of coal as an alternative to the country's dependence on foreign oil not that long ago. If the use of coal is to become more widespread, as an alternative energy source, it becomes doubley important that the safety issues be addressed, as well as the pollution concerns.

Edited January 9, 2006 by patricia