Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Editorial: Mine rescue system needs overhaul
President Bush abandoned a plan to reform the system in favor of 'non-regulatory alternatives.'
From the RoundTable blog
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One of the miners who died in the aftermath of an explosion at the Sago Mine in West Virginia last week survived at least 10 hours, according to notes he wrote before he died.
It's unclear when the first rescue team arrived, but that team had to wait for backup before it could enter the mine. That didn't arrive until 11 hours after the explosion. An additional 40 hours would pass before the lone survivor and 12 victims of the disaster were found.
The delay may have been inevitable, but an article in the Charleston, W.Va., Sunday Gazette-Mail suggests that long-festering and serious problems with the nation's mine rescue system could have contributed.
In 1995, "a major federal report prepared by a conference of industry, labor and rescue team representatives urged speedy action by [the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration] to do something to reverse the troubling erosion of the country's mine emergency response system," the Gazette-Mail reported.
Trained rescuers are retiring, and their positions are not being filled. Many smaller coal companies are contracting with rescue companies rather than maintaining their own.
Between 2000 and 2002, the number of MSHA-approved rescue teams dropped by 10 percent.
While the law requires two rescue teams for each mine, the newspaper found that, nationwide, there is only one registered team for every four mines.
A plan to upgrade MSHA's mine rescue program was drafted by the Clinton administration, but quietly abandoned when President Bush came into office in favor of "non-regulatory alternatives."
Instead of beefing up the system, rescue teams maintained at local MSHA offices like the one in nearby Morgantown, W.Va., were phased out in favor of a single MSHA-wide emergency crew.
Accounts conflict about why it took so long for rescuers to enter the Sago mine.
One company official said that it was because of concern about high levels of carbon monoxide in the mine. Later, though, another official said it was a matter of "mustering, getting your equipment and heading to the mine site, which is somewhat remote, comparatively speaking."
President Clinton's MSHA director, Davitt McAteer, said, "The first rule of mine rescue is that you have to be quick.... It should not take 12 hours to get teams together."
Sago should serve as a rallying cry to resurrect the discarded MSHA plan. Clearly, "non-regulatory alternatives" are insufficient to address the serious deficiencies of the nation's mine-rescue system.
