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Massey Coal Mine Explosion Kills 25; Four Missing (Update3)
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By Samantha Zee


April 6 (Bloomberg) -- An explosion at a coal mine in West Virginia killed 25 workers and left four missing, said Massey Energy Co., the owner of the pit. The disaster was the worst of its kind since 1984.

Two miners were hospitalized and rescue work at the Upper Big Branch mine was halted because of “conditions underground,” Richmond, Virginia-based Massey said in a statement today. Rescue efforts will resume as soon as conditions allow, the company said.

“Tonight we mourn the deaths of our members at Massey Energy,” Chief Executive Officer Don Blankenship said in the statement.

U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration District Manager Robert Hardman was leading rescue efforts at the mine site, U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis said in a statement. The agency was notified of the blast at about 3 p.m. local time yesterday.

“Our number one priority is to locate the missing miners and bring them to safety,” Solis said.

MSHA Coal Mine Safety and Health Administrator Kevin Stricklin is also at the mine and in touch with Assistant Secretary of Labor for Mine Safety and Health Joe Main. MSHA sent officials to liaise with miners’ relatives, Amy Louviere, a spokeswoman for the agency, said in an e-mailed statement.

‘Difficult Time’

Massey dropped 9.6 percent to $49.46 at 9:36 a.m. on the New York Stock Exchange. The stock has risen 17 percent this year.

The mine is operated by Performance Coal Co., a unit of Massey, the largest coal producer in the Central Appalachian region. Massey operated 56 mines as of Jan. 31, including 42 underground and 14 surface mines, in West Virginia, Kentucky and Virginia, according to a regulatory filing.

As will as operating underground, Massey also uses the technique of mountaintop mining in the Appalachian hills, in which mountain peaks are blown away by dynamite to expose coal.

“It is a difficult time for us,” said Roger Hendriksen, a spokesman for Massey. He declined to say how many employees were working at the mine in Raleigh County at the time of the blast.

President Barack Obama, who spoke with West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin at about 8 p.m. local time yesterday, said the federal government is ready to offer whatever assistance is needed in the rescue effort.

Rescue Teams

“There are miners that were injured from the initial blast, who weren’t trapped, who are being treated, but there are fatalities and there are still miners trapped,” said Leslie Fitzwater, a spokeswoman for the West Virginia Department of Commerce.

“Coal is one of our major industries so we have people trained to respond to these incidents,” she said.

The MSHA said five rescue teams from Conso Energy and Massey were at the scene, the Associated Press reported. The mine has a total of 200 workers, according to the AP.

“We’ve offered help,” said Phil Smith, a spokesman for the United Mine Workers of America. The MSHA “will be working in conjunction with the state and the company to develop a plan for affecting a rescue effort,” he said.

The accident is the worst U.S. mine disaster in 26 years, according to data on the United States Mine Rescue Association Web site.

Rescue workers “are putting their lives on the line, entering a highly dangerous mine to bring any survivors to safety,” United Mine Workers International President Cecil E. Roberts said in a statement. The Upper Big Branch mine is a “non-union mine,” he said.

2009 Fatalities

Ron Wooten, director of the West Virginia Office of Miners’ Health Safety and Training, didn’t immediately return a call and e-mail seeking comment. There were at least three fatalities related to coal mining operations in West Virginia last year, according to the agency.

Upper Big Branch was the site of two fatal accidents in the past decade, the agency Web site shows.

An electrician was electrocuted while splicing a trailing cable on a shuttle car in 2003, and a continuous miner operator was struck by rock after a section of mine roof fell in 2001. He died days later from his injuries. In 1998, a general laborer at the mine died after a section he was working on collapsed and crushed him.

Two miners were killed by a fire on a conveyor belt at Massey’s Aracoma Alma Mine No. 1 at Melville in Logan County, West Virginia, in January 2006, according to the mining safety agency’s Web site. The incident occurred late in the same month an explosion at the Sago mine in West Virginia operated by International Coal Group killed 12 miners.

Rescuers yesterday pulled free 114 coal miners trapped for more than a week in a flooded pit in China, holder of the world’s worst record in mining safety, state television reported. Thirty-nine workers may still be alive and trapped underground, China Central Television reported yesterday.

To contact the reporter on this story: Samantha Zee in San Francisco at szee@bloomberg.net.