The day before, the company published the results of its internal investigation into the January 2 blast. In its report, ICG claims the cause of the explosion was a lightning strike. In a company statement released along with the report, ICG president Ben Hatfield called the explosion “an unpredictable and highly unusual accident.”

The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) denounced the company for releasing results of its investigation before the federal and state inspectors. “There is a reason companies aren’t allowed to investigate themselves in these kinds of instances, which is that they will do or say anything to limit their liability,” said UMWA president Cecil Roberts in a March 15 statement. “ICG is essentially saying it was an Act of God, and we all know you can’t sue God.”

The union pointed to holes in ICG’s “findings.” “ICG even acknowledges that it doesn’t know how an electrical charge could have traveled from the surface to the mine and ignited an explosion,” Roberts said. “To publicize their unfounded conclusion now, well before the official investigation by federal and state experts is finished, is extremely reckless.”

A focus of the investigation has been the use of a foam compound called Omega Block, introduced in the 1990s, which was used to seal off the unworked section of the Sago Mine where the explosion occurred. The mine bosses prefer to use this foam block because it is quicker to install and cheaper than concrete blockthat was the standard before the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) approved the use of Omega.

All 10 of these seals in the Sago Mine were blown out by the explosion, spreading the fire, smoke, and gas into the working sections of the mine. The blast instantly killed one mine worker. Twelve others were trapped deeper inside the mine and slowly suffocated. Rescue teams did not begin entering the mine until 11 hours after the blast and found the trapped men, all but one dead, 42 hours after the explosion. The lone miner who survived, Randy McCloy Jr., was in a coma for three weeks. He is still in rehabilitation for a speech impediment and receives nutrition through a feeding tube, which is likely to remain for weeks ahead, reported the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

A series in the Post-Gazette shows that Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) approved the use of foam seals knowing they were far less effective in containing blasts than concrete.

The paper reported on a July 2001 test conducted by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). “To determine the ultimate failure pressure of various seal designs…researchers pumped a methane-oxygen mixture into the chamber and triggered explosions,” the daily said in its March 12 issue. “While eight of the 11 traditional concrete block walls withstood blasts ranging from 66 psi [pounds per square inch] to 86 psi, three to four times the standard, the unhitched, 40-inch-thick Omega Block wall, the design cleared for use at Sago, failed at 17.9 psi.”

According to ICG’s own inquiry, the concrete seals tested by NIOSH would likely have withstood the force of the blast. “The forces of the explosion were as high as 30 psi at roofline at all the seals and physical evidence at some locations near the seals within the sealed area indicate pressures of 60 psi or higher,” ICG said. MSHA, however, requires that seals only be able to withstand 20 psi—less than half the requirement for coal mines in Australia, Canada, and the UK.

ICG claims that the Sago explosion was “unpredictable” and “highly unusual.” But a 2001 NIOSH report cited in the Post-Gazette shows there had been seven such explosions in sealed off areas of mines in the previous six years.

Two weeks prior to the reopening of Sago, a blast erupted in Drummond Co.’s Shoal Creek Mine in Alabama. Miners say that three Omega Blocks in a ventilation wall, or “brattice,” inside the mine were sucked out of the wall by the force of the ventilation fan. This may have interfered with the ventilation and led to the build up of methane that caused the explosion, the Post-Gazette reported.

Meanwhile, the stock of ICG, which was founded by billionaire Wilbur Ross, rose more than 3 percent the day the Sago Mine reopened. The company released its fourth-quarter earnings report the same day, noting that revenue increased 27 percent to nearly $650 million in 2005 and coal production is up 4.5 percent from last year. Ross told the Wall Street Journal in January that the company’s goal is to become the “top low-cost producer” in the industry. He also bragged in Fortune magazine nine days after the Sago explosion that the company had planned to expand production there from 350,000 tons of coal to 900,000 tons this year. In spite of the explosion, Ross said, “Our fundamental position is unchanged.”
 
 
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