In July, after reviewing safety records for Massey Energy, the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) blasted the safety record of the company's operations and contractors. Only 4 percent of Massey's more than 3,600 employees are unionized. UMWA president Cecil Roberts said Massey has "the nation's worst fatality record" and said that the "company's record of death and injury cannot be allowed to continue at its present rate." West Virginia governor Robert Wise has ordered an investigation into safety in the industry, to be headed up by Davitt McAteer, former director of the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration.

The UMWA reported that Massey has increased the number of contractors working at its mines. Roberts explained that this enables the company to mask its overall abysmal health and safety record because the bosses don't have to report the injuries of workers employed by contractors as part of the safety record at the mine.

The UMWA review found that from 1997 to 2000, lost-time accident rates for workers employed by contractors have doubled at Massey mines, while rates for coal miners employed by Massey in these mines has tripled.

The UMWA has also targeted Massey's poor environmental record, such as the massive spill in October 2000 from a slurry pond in Kentucky, run by Martin County Coal, a Massey subsidiary. In the wake of that spill, residents in southern West Virginia, particularly in Big Coal River Valley where Massey has a number of operations, have stepped up protests over the dangers of Massey's slurry ponds, dust from Massey strip mines, and runoff problems from Massey mines, including mountaintop removal mining operations. The UMWA called for an inspection of all Massey Energy impoundments and facilities.  
 
Devastating floods
West Virginia has also been hit with four devastating floods this summer, which have done damage in excess of $100 million and left several thousand West Virginians homeless. Some 1,500 houses have been destroyed and another 5,700 have been damaged. Twenty-four of the state's 55 counties have been declared flood disaster areas since May.

One particularly hard hit town is Mullens, in southern West Virginia. Windowless shells of what used to be diners, flower shops, and general stores line the streets of downtown Mullens. Entire blocks of battered houses sit empty in the south end of town.

These floods have fueled opposition among working people to how many companies carry out their operations, leading to a spat of lawsuits against more than a dozen mining and logging companies. The complaints cite the companies' "careless, willful, wanton, and malicious misconduct" and charge that flood victims have been scarred by "the terrifying spectacle of flood water raging down on them laden with all manner of coal mine and timber refuse."

In July, hundreds of area residents in Big Coal River Valley packed in to the Coal River Mountain Watch office in Whitesville to grill state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) inspectors. As one resident said, "It's time to hold the coal companies responsible."

DEP inspectors cited some coal companies for flood-related incidents including the collapse of part of a valley fill and a sediment ditch giving out. As a result of these failures water and mud flowed into the communities below.

Mining company officials denied responsibility, claiming that mining had nothing to do with the devastation. A spokesman for AEI Resources said, "The rain did this."

After similar flooding in eastern Kentucky in early August, William Caylor, president of the bosses' Kentucky Coal Association, said, "You can't blame it on coal. Mother Nature is releasing a very abnormal amount of rainfall. It's not fair to blame a particular industry when Mother Nature is to blame."

In West Virginia, DEP secretary Michael Callaghan stated, "The way some of these mining operations are set up, they stopped the flooding.... I think it could have been worse if they hadn't been there." Saying the governor agreed, a spokesperson for Wise stated, "There is no data or evidence yet one way or the other." Wise has ordered a study to determine if mining or logging contributed to the flooding.

But one Kentucky resident, whose home was deluged with mud and debris that came crashing off the mountainside, said, "All of this is mining related." Another resident explained that "there's just so much surface disturbance and so much more runoff. We're seeing more damage from flash floods because of it."

And draft reports from a study by the U.S. Office of Surface Mining and the Army Corps of Engineers show that the way mining companies currently carry out mountaintop removal and other strip mining operations tends to make floods more likely and much worse when they do occur. The study was done as part of a settlement to a federal lawsuit over mountaintop removal mining.

One of the areas studied was Arch Coal Inc.'s huge Samples mine on Kayford Mountain where there has been severe flooding. The engineers found that one large valley fill would increase runoff by about 3 percent, while a second would increase the flow by 13 percent.

At another Arch mine, the study reported an extremely large valley fill would increase runoff by about 42 percent. While this study was meant to be completed by the end of 2000, the project has been delayed and no results have been formally published. After coming into office, Governor Wise contacted federal officials and requested they withhold publication of the study.  
 
 
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