Courtesy of the Coal Mining Heritage Association of Montgomery County

On April 18, 1946, 12 New River Valley miners died when a portion of the Great Valley mine in McCoy exploded. An outdoor funeral was held for five of the men on April 20 at Parrot Methodist Church in Pulaski County.

MCCOY -- Before 33 people were killed at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007, another April day stood out as the deadliest in Montgomery County history.

On April 18, 1946, 11 men from Montgomery and Pulaski counties died in a catastrophic explosion at the Great Valley Anthracite Mine in McCoy. Another miner injured in the blast died later.

Today, all that's left of that mine is a slag pile, visible from the air as a blackened 10-acre scar near the riverbank.

But just as the tipples and company houses at other mine sites scattered across the county have faded from view, so, too, will the last vestige of Great Valley soon disappear from the landscape.

The estimated $129,000 cleanup of its slag pile began in March, state mine reclamation inspector Garry Cole said. It will be paid for by the sale of coal, some of it from this very site, through a partnership between the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy and coal companies.

As the tons of debris are removed from the site, old coal buried along with it is mechanically separated then shipped to the town of Appalachia, where it is mixed with newly mined coal to be sold on the open market, Cole said.

Sale of the McCoy coal is expected to fund up to $126,000 of the remediation costs. The remaining $3,000 will be paid out of state fees collected on new coal extraction, Cole said.

The semi-anthracite coal deposits found in Montgomery County are geologically some of the oldest in North America and, according to Jim Price of the Coal Mining Heritage Association of Montgomery County, have been mined since 1745.

But local coal can be difficult and dangerous to extract. The seams roll and pitch underground and, when dug, the tunnel roofs and walls are more prone to cave-ins than in other geologic areas, Cole said. The coal deposits also contain higher-than-average levels of methane, making explosions more likely.

"There were many different ways for the men to die," Cole said.

And they did. The names of 43 men and one boy killed in county mine accidents are etched onto the Coal Miners Memorial in McCoy.

Miners could die in explosions and roof falls. They could smother to death when their digging released gasses trapped in the coal seams. Scores of others suffered later with black lung and other mining-related diseases.

But mining helped many Montgomery families survive the Great Depression. Jim Price's father and uncle were among the men who went into the dark tunnels, sometimes thousands of feet underground. His uncle died at Great Valley.

"But they went back, quite fearlessly," Cole said. "They knew what they were doing was important. They knew it had to be done."

At one point, there were 181 mines or prospects active on Price Mountain alone. Production peaked between 1943 and 1944 at 200,000 tons. The bulk of the county's mine operations, both large and small, had closed the 1960s. Many were simply abandoned -- buildings left to topple, equipment left to rust and mine entrances left open.

Today, abandoned mines and slag piles dot the flanks of Price and Brush mountains. State officials know of about 104 acres across the county that contain old mines and waste piles that require sealing and cleanup. They suspect more exist. And they are still dangerous, Cole said.

Erstwhile explorers can fall into the open shafts or sinkholes caused when old mine tunnels collapse. Water seeping into mines from streams or flooding can build up enormous pressure, sometimes causing "blowouts" that can be deadly to those living nearby. Cole said he has seen places where the whole side of a mountain has blown, causing rock falls and mud slides.

The mines can leak "acid water," damaging streams. Old slag piles can catch fire and burn for years, releasing noxious and toxic fumes, as happened in 2006 on Mount Zion Road in Montgomery County. The total cost to stabilize the known local sites is estimated at $1.3 million, Cole said.

But the problem is even more widespread in the Coalfields counties of far Southwest Virginia -- Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Scott, Wise, Tazewell and Russell. Currently the state is overseeing cleanup of 31 sites, most in the coalfields.

Every year since 2003, the state has spent between $5 million and $6 million on such projects and is expected to spend $9 million this year, said Mike Abbott of the Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy.

Experts say reclamation of all abandoned mines across the commonwealth could take as much as $400 million.

On the Net: dmme.virginia.gov