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Utah Collapse Brings Closer Scrutiny of Mine Safety Reform    [

    Murray's Meltdown: Angry, Rambling Briefing Draws Rebukes
    By Robert Gehrke and Paul Beebe
    The Salt Lake Tribune

    Wednesday 08 August 2007

Mine owner ignores demand he turn over rescue updates to feds.

    Robert Murray scoured the skies for the helicopters above Crandall Canyon, refusing to continue his disjointed, rambling Tuesday morning media briefing until the county sheriff chased them off.

    It was a public relations meltdown that prompted the chairman of the U.S. House labor committee to demand that federal officials take the helm of all future briefings on the cave-in that trapped six men in the Crandall Canyon coal mine.

    But in many ways it appears to have been Murray being Murray - an eccentric, passionate, politically connected coal executive who has never shied from speaking his mind.

    In his briefing, an update of the Crandall Canyon mine collapse that was carried live on national television, Murray defended the coal industry, attacked the media and railed against what he called a foolhardy crusade against global warming that jeopardized his industry and America's economy.

    Murray insisted there was no way the collapse was not caused by an earthquake - "It was a natural disaster and I'll prove it to you" - even though a federal geologist said Tuesday evening the collapse was absolutely not caused by an earthquake.

    Crisis management and public relations authorities criticized Murray's performance as "callous," "damaging" and "not very helpful" to the families of the six miners trapped underground.

    "The families of the six trapped miners are deeply worried about the welfare of their loved ones. They need and have a right to the most credible, objective, and up-to-date information available about the status of the rescue effort," said Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., chairman of the House labor committee. "The news conference held this morning at the mine did not meet this standard."

    After the Sago mine disaster in West Virginia, where confusing and contradictory information was given to families and the press, Congress passed a law requiring a Mine Safety and Health Administration official to handle communications with the families, press and public.

    Tuesday afternoon, MSHA head Richard Stickler handled the briefing, but Murray was back in front of the microphone Tuesday evening. "It's his mine, he's entitled to hold whatever press conference he wants," said MSHA spokeswoman Amy Louviere.

    "His behavior is the beginning of blame-shifting, which causes people to dislike business leaders and to distrust those who blame others for their problems," said James Lukaszewski, president of The Lukaszewski Group, a White Plains, N.Y., crisis management consulting firm.

    Laura Crawshaw, president of Executive Insight Development Group, a Salt Lake City-based firm that coaches abrasive executives, said that, "The role of a leader during crisis is not to defend himself or his company. Murray opened his address by defending the value of coal mining and the safety practices of his company. This is not what people need or want to hear in such a moment."

    Murray deserves some sympathy, said Chris Thomas, owner of The Intrepid Group, a Salt Lake City public relations company, who was spokesman for the family of Elizabeth Smart during her abduction five years go.

    "The pressure in a situation like this is indescribable unless you've experienced it yourself. From my own experience, usually the main principles are physically and emotionally exhausted," Thomas said.

    Murray is a man who wears his emotions publicly, whether it's clashing with Congress, scolding regulators or briefing reporters.

    Born into a mining family in Ohio, Murray was 9 when his father was paralyzed by a fall at a mining convention, according to a profile in the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.

    Upon leaving North American Coal Corp. after 31 years with the company, he bought his first mine, the Powhatan No. 6 mine in Alledonia, Ohio. Over the years his company grew to include mines in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Illinois, West Virginia.

    Last year, he completed the purchase of the former Andalex Resources mines in Utah. One of his first moves was to shut down the Tower Mine, idling 114 workers less than two weeks before Christmas.

    Murray blamed environmentalists and state regulators who had been slow to approve production at the Lila mine, forcing him to cut jobs, he told the Price-based Sun Advocate. John Baza, head of the state's Division of Oil and Gas, disagreed, writing the paper to say the layoffs were a business decision unrelated to the Lila mine, which was delayed because Murray's company hadn't provided necessary information.

    Murray is strident in his belief that global warming is a fraud. In June, he told a Senate committee that Congressional Democrats and former Vice President Al Gore are bent on "the destruction of American lives and more death as a result of his hysterical global goofiness with no environmental benefit."

    He called Sen. Hillary Clinton "anti-American" in an interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto after the senator said America needs a president who will defend workers' rights.

    And he bashed politicians who, after mine disasters in West Virginia last year, called for new safety measures.

    "I resent these politicians playing politics with my employees' safety," he said in an article in the Columbus Dispatch. "I resent them because I take the safety of my miners to bed with me every night."

    But safety at some of his mines was suspect. Only a few months' data is available for the Crandall Canyon mine under his ownership, but at several other mines owned by Murray, the accident rate was well above the national average, in some years several times the rate for comparable mines.

    And in 2003, KenAmerican Resources, a company owned by Murray, was convicted of violating mine safety laws at a Kentucky mine and the company was fined $306,000.

    Murray backs his political beliefs with his pocketbook. He contributed more than $213,000 to Republican candidates over the last decade. Three political action committees tied to Murray's businesses have given $724,500 to Republican candidates and causes, including $4,000 to Rep. Chris Cannon.

    He made use of his political ties to Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell, who is married to Labor Secretary Elaine Chao and oversees MSHA, to get back at a safety regulator who had crossed him, according to the Lexington Herald-Journal. In the meeting, Murray shouted that "Mitch McConnell calls me one of the five finest men in America, and last I checked, he was sleeping with your boss."

    Murray denied he referred to McConnell and Chao sleeping together. Tim Thompson, the MSHA manager who was the target of Murray's wrath, was reassigned and later retired.

 

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    Utah Collapse Brings Closer Scrutiny of Mine Safety Reform
    By Faye Bowers
    The Christian Science Monitor

    Wednesday 08 August 2007

As tunneling to reach trapped Utah coal miners progresses slowly, officials assess the nation's implementation of changes mandated after the Sago disaster.

    Phoenix - In the year and a half since a coal-mine disaster in West Virginia gripped the nation and caused fresh scrutiny of mine safety regulations, the US government has beefed up efforts to keep miners that may be trapped below ground alive longer and redoubled efforts to identify potential safety hazards and fine companies.

    Now, as another desperate race against time unfolds in another coal mine 2,000 miles away, industry observers confirm that overall mine safety has improved, but say more can be done by the industry to improve mining practices.

    "The government learned lessons from Sago," says J. Davitt McAteer, a former official with the US government's Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), referring to the mine explosion in West Virginia in which 12 miners perished and one, miraculously, survived.

    Heralded as the most significant mining legislation in 30 years, the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act, signed into law by President Bush on June 15, 2006, was a result of investigations into the Sago accident.

    The three key changes, Mr. McAteer says, are requirements to provide enough oxygen for workers to survive for as long as 50 hours, provide wireless communications, and harden the chambers where miners can await rescue.

    The general rule is that "if you can keep them alive for 50 hours, we can get to them," says McAteer, now vice president at Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia. The six miners now trapped in a Utah coal mine have enough air and water to survive for several days, according to officials at the Crandall Canyon Mine.

    McAteer says it appears, because officials have no way to communicate with the trapped miners, that the Crandall Canyon Mine still used the old land-line telephone system. The new legislation called for wireless communications to be developed within three years, so the Crandall Canyon Mine would have been in compliance.

    The other most important change called for, according to McAteer, was the hardening of chambers in which miners can hold out during rescue efforts. Those were required in West Virginia but not in the rest of the country.

    It is too early to know what caused the collapse at the Crandall Canyon Mine. Early reports indicated an earthquake caused the cave-in, and the mine's parent company insisted Tuesday that is in fact what happened. Others, though, said the explosion in the mine probably caused the 3.9 magnitude seismic waves recorded at the University of Utah. Experts say it will take until Wednesday morning to determine which scenario is correct.

    At time of writing Tuesday, rescuers continued tunneling through 1,500 tons of debris to try to reach the miners trapped nearly four miles deep in the mine. "They are working in 12-hour shifts to rebuild damaged ventilation controls," according to officials at MSHA. "Approximately 22 miners are expected to go underground on dayshift. Equipment moves and equipment preparation are ongoing. A total of 12 mine rescue teams are available to go underground, with four teams currently on site."

    In addition to the clearing of debris in the tunnel leading to the trapped miners, other crews attempted to drill holes into the top of the mine to provide fresh air to the miners.

    Murray Energy Group, which owns the Crandall Mine, is in the process of "exhausting efforts" to reach the trapped miners, Bob Murray, company president, said early Tuesday. Still, it will take at least three days to reach them, he says. Rescuers are 2,000 feet from the closest access point.

    The company has moved in 30 pieces of massive mining equipment, Mr. Murray says. Some 134 men, mostly professionals from other mines, are working in six teams on rescue efforts. Even so, the teams have moved only 310 feet closer to the trapped miners from where they started - gaining only 50 feet Tuesday night.

    The MSHA has issued 325 citations against the Crandall Canyon Mine since 2004, according to the agency's online records. Of those, 116 were considered "significant and substantial," which means they are likely to cause injuries.

    Last month, inspectors cited the mine for violating a rule requiring that at least two passageways be designed for escape in an emergency.

    The 325 citations would not be "an unusual number," says McAteer. "The ones that are troubling are where there's a mine-evacuation violation. Those are troubling events and those shouldn't happen."