Two more miners dead?

[NNadir]

I wonder how quickly we will forget these guys if they don't turn up?

MELVILLE, W.Va. - Five rescue teams were deep inside a coal mine Friday searching for two miners who never made it out after a conveyer belt caught fire. Nineteen others had reached the surface safely, state officials said.


The fire started Thursday evening inside the Alma No. 1 Mine operated by Massey Energy subsidiary Aracoma Coal, about 60 miles southwest of Charleston, officials said.

The missing miners had just entered the mine for their evening shift when a carbon monoxide monitor, about 10,000 feet from the mine entrance, set off an alarm at 5:36 p.m., said Doug Conaway, director of the state Office of Miners' Health Safety and Training.

About 10 minutes later, the company told the miners to get out, Conaway said.

The missing miners were part of a group of 12 who encountered smoke as they left, put on breathing gear and continued to the surface, but only 10 made it out. Nine other miners in another part of the mine also escaped.

[NNadir]

1. Their bodies have been found.

The number of dead this month in West Virginia is now 14.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060122/ap_on_re_us/mine_fire

And now, back to whatever it was we were doing before this unimportant story, unworthy of comment, was posted.

[Kool Kitty]

2. This is so sad and criminal.

Seems like the story is to get more coal out of the ground, as quickly as possible, weaken all the safety standards. (Not that there seem to be many, actually.) What a fucking waste of these lives.

[aztc]

3. Tragedy

This filthy industry costs too much and has for decades. It also supplies fuel for most of the electricity generated on the East coast of the US, and a great deal of the rest. So-called 'clean coal' technology never takes the human cost, long & near term, into account. In a rare instance of agreement with the top nuke lover on this board, I wish this story got more attention, and was framed in a way to raise awareness of the connection to the average consumers power meter.

Maybe the power bill should include details about the coal mining industry.