The Militant - February 20, 2006 -- Gains from union fight for safety on job saved lives of 72 potash miners in Canada

Vol. 70/No. 7 February 20, 2006

Gains from union fight for safety on job
saved lives of 72 potash miners in Canada

Militant/Michael Pennock

Miners who are members of the Communcations, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP) at the K-2 potash mine in Esterhazy, Saskatchewan, meet with Militant reporters February 4 at union hall. From left: CEP member Ray Miller, Militant reporters Nelson Gonzalez and Joe Young, CEP members Dale Burman and Hugh Davis, and Militant reporter Annette Kouri.

BY ANNETTE KOURI
AND JOE YOUNG
ESTERHAZY, Saskatchewan—Seventy-two potash miners were trapped underground here January 29 after a fire filled the K-2 mine with toxic smoke. The miners—members of locals 890 and 892 of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union—spent up to 30 hours in refuge stations before being rescued. An initial investigation indicates a cutting torch set the fire in some polyethylene pipe.

The mine is owned by the U.S.-based Mosaic company. The media here lauded the mine owners for safety measures that led to the rescue.

Interviews with union members here over the February 4-5 weekend, however, point to the union-led struggle for safe working conditions as the reason for the survival of the trapped miners.

Workers report they won a union at the mine after a strike in 1972. “There were a lot of close calls,” before union-initiated safety measures were implemented, said Ray Miller, who has worked in the mine for 27 years. Among the gains were refuge rooms throughout the mine. These are airtight areas with enough oxygen to last at least 36 hours.

The mine rescue team members are volunteers from the mine. Hugh Davis, a mechanic who was part of the team that rescued the trapped miners January 29, told the Militant he received a call at 3:00 a.m. that day. Within 15 minutes he was at the mine, he said. His team entered the mine at 5:00 a.m., after backup teams arrived, about two-and-a-half hours after the fire had started.

Dale Burman, the union co-chair of the safety committee, described the situation when water began seeping into the mine in the mid-1980s. “We didn’t have a strong safety committee so we had to start one,” he said. “If I didn’t have the union backing me it would have been very hard to get safety up to snuff.”

While the Saskatchewan provincial government has adopted mine safety regulations, Glenn St. Marie explained, “If you don’t have a union, the government will not look after you as good or as fast. You have to have a force to implement them.”

“We’re just lucky that this happened on the weekend,” said Doug Millham, another unionist. “I hate to think what the refuge stations would have been like with 200 or so people down there.”

“It’s a constant vigil, a day-to-day battle,” Ray Miller said. Referring to the recent rash of deaths in U.S. coal mines, he added, “We know it can happen here.”

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