Blankenship always is the authority. He is always the one who knows best. Everyone else is ignorant. His employees are ignorant, his supervisors are ignorant, the union is ignorant and the government is ignorant, I am ignorant, god is ignorant. The only learned person is Blankenship. Got that? You better.
If he complains about personal attacks, it is because everyone else are defending themselves from his personal attacks. You know, we are all ignorant.
14 years of work by two Pittsburgh lawyers (click here)
05.11.13
...In February former Massey Energy executive David Hughart stood in a courtroom in Beckley, West Virginia and pleaded guilty to obstructing the work of federal safety inspectors. Massey’s chairman and CEO Donald Blankenship, the most powerful coal baron in the history of the American coal industry, ran the company with an iron fist in an iron glove. He had control over even the smallest detail and most likely would have told his subordinate what to do. Despite that, if events transpired the way they almost always have in the history of coal and power in Appalachia, Blankenship would not be touched or his name even mentioned in the criminal proceedings....
Massey Energy had thousands of violations with the EPA. The EPA just decided to list everyone involved who was ignorant in order to get all the violations addressed.
In all honesty, this isn't worth my time. The documentation that is 'of course, ignorant' is extensive. (click here)
Massey is going to try to tell the entire country he has no problem managing mines and protecting lives? Really?
Martin County coal slurry spill
Oct. 23 (2011)By Geraldine Sealey
A gooey gray river of coal waste, (click here) the consistency of soft-serve ice
cream, is oozing through waterways in Kentucky and West Virginia,
inflicting what officials are calling the worst environmental disaster
to hit the region in more than a decade.
So far, more than 100 miles of creeks, streams, and rivers have been
affected, despite attempts by federal and state crews to contain the
spreading mess. No human injuries have been reported, but the smothering
sludge has been deadly to wildlife.
About 250 million gallons of the creeping goo, known as coal slurry,
leaked from a Martin County Coal Corp. waste containment pond on Oct. 11
in Inez, Ky., about 140 miles east of Lexington, and has been inching
through streams and rivers. The polluting glop meandered from the mine
into creeks, then down the Big Sandy River and into the Ohio River last
Friday....
Aracoma Alma Mine accident
OVERVIEW (click here)
At approximately 5:14 p.m. on January 19, 2006, a fire occurred at the
9 Headgatelongwall belt takeup storage unit of the Aracoma Alma
Mine #1, resulting in the deaths of two miners. Twenty-nine underground miners were working on this shift. Initial attempts to extinguish the fire failed, and observations at the scene indicated that smoke from the fire was traveling further into the mine via the 2 Section intake air course. Miners in affected areas were neither immediately notified nor withdrawn followingthe initial carbon monoxide (CO) alarm signal from the Atmospheric Monitoring
System (AMS)....
Upper Big Branch Report (click here)
This report is dedicated to the men who lost their lives in the Upper Big Branch mine:
Carl Calvin Acord
Jason Atkins
Christopher Bell
Gregory Steven Brock
Kenneth Allan Chapman
Robert E. Clark
Cory Thomas Davis
Charles Timothy Davis
Michael Lee Elswick
William Ildon Griffith
Steven Harrah
Edward Dean Jones
Richard K. Lane
William Roosevelt Lynch
Joe Marcum
Ronald Lee Maynor
Nicolas Darrell McCroskey
James E. “Eddie” Mooney
Adam Keith Morgan
Rex L. Mullins
Joshua Scott Napper
Howard D. Payne
Dillard Earl Persinger
Joel R. Price
Gary Wayne Quarles
Deward Allan Scott
Grover Dale Skeens
Benny Ray Willingham
Ricky Workman
There are real people, with real families and had real lives. Now there are memories. There are broken and wounded families and I will not allow that horrible man to celebrate his own cruel managing methodology. He killed people and I suppose that is hard to actually live with, but, that is the truth and there is overwhelming evidence to that reality.
In memory of THE MEN OF THE UPPER BIG BRANCH MINE (click here)
Carl Calvin “Pee Wee” Acord
Carl Calvin “Pee Wee” Acord, 52, had worked in the mines for 34 years and was a proud member of the “Old Man Crew” at the Upper Big Branch Mine. He enjoyed fishing with his sons, working in his yard, driving his tractor and being “PaPaw” to his two grandchildren, Chase and Cameron. He is survived by his wife, Joyce Lynn, and sons, Cody and Casey.
Don Blankenship never asked one question. He simply believed he had to get on with mining and keeping people employed because of course, his operations were on the verge of bankruptcy at any minute if there wasn't coal coming out of the ground before the blood dried. It was his obligation to make sure there was food on the table of his miners that counted on him.
IN CONCLUSION (click here)
“Some pretty hard questions have got to be asked. The families need answers, and we, as a country, need answers. Something has gone drastically wrong – and we need to find out what it is, what happened, and we need to do our best to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” said Kate Wilkinson, New Zealand Minister of Conservation, on the loss of 29 miners at the Pike River coal mine in November 2010.
“MSHA is launching a full investigation to determine the cause of this tragedy and will take the necessary steps to ensure that this never happens again,” said U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, on the loss of 12 miners in the Sago mine, in Buckhannon, West Virginia, January 4, 2006.
“We just have got to find the answers to what caused this and to make sure whatever it takes that this never happens again,” West Virginia Governor (now U.S. Senator) Joe Manchin III, said on April 11, 2010....
Aracoma Alma Mine accident
OVERVIEW (click here)
At approximately 5:14 p.m. on January 19, 2006, a fire occurred at the
9 Headgatelongwall belt takeup storage unit of the Aracoma Alma
Mine #1, resulting in the deaths of two miners. Twenty-nine underground miners were working on this shift. Initial attempts to extinguish the fire failed, and observations at the scene indicated that smoke from the fire was traveling further into the mine via the 2 Section intake air course. Miners in affected areas were neither immediately notified nor withdrawn followingthe initial carbon monoxide (CO) alarm signal from the Atmospheric Monitoring
System (AMS)....
Upper Big Branch Report (click here)
This report is dedicated to the men who lost their lives in the Upper Big Branch mine:
Carl Calvin Acord
Jason Atkins
Christopher Bell
Gregory Steven Brock
Kenneth Allan Chapman
Robert E. Clark
Cory Thomas Davis
Charles Timothy Davis
Michael Lee Elswick
William Ildon Griffith
Steven Harrah
Edward Dean Jones
Richard K. Lane
William Roosevelt Lynch
Joe Marcum
Ronald Lee Maynor
Nicolas Darrell McCroskey
James E. “Eddie” Mooney
Adam Keith Morgan
Rex L. Mullins
Joshua Scott Napper
Howard D. Payne
Dillard Earl Persinger
Joel R. Price
Gary Wayne Quarles
Deward Allan Scott
Grover Dale Skeens
Benny Ray Willingham
Ricky Workman
There are real people, with real families and had real lives. Now there are memories. There are broken and wounded families and I will not allow that horrible man to celebrate his own cruel managing methodology. He killed people and I suppose that is hard to actually live with, but, that is the truth and there is overwhelming evidence to that reality.
Carl Calvin “Pee Wee” Acord
Carl Calvin “Pee Wee” Acord, 52, had worked in the mines for 34 years and was a proud member of the “Old Man Crew” at the Upper Big Branch Mine. He enjoyed fishing with his sons, working in his yard, driving his tractor and being “PaPaw” to his two grandchildren, Chase and Cameron. He is survived by his wife, Joyce Lynn, and sons, Cody and Casey.
Don Blankenship never asked one question. He simply believed he had to get on with mining and keeping people employed because of course, his operations were on the verge of bankruptcy at any minute if there wasn't coal coming out of the ground before the blood dried. It was his obligation to make sure there was food on the table of his miners that counted on him.
IN CONCLUSION (click here)
“Some pretty hard questions have got to be asked. The families need answers, and we, as a country, need answers. Something has gone drastically wrong – and we need to find out what it is, what happened, and we need to do our best to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” said Kate Wilkinson, New Zealand Minister of Conservation, on the loss of 29 miners at the Pike River coal mine in November 2010.
“MSHA is launching a full investigation to determine the cause of this tragedy and will take the necessary steps to ensure that this never happens again,” said U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, on the loss of 12 miners in the Sago mine, in Buckhannon, West Virginia, January 4, 2006.
“We just have got to find the answers to what caused this and to make sure whatever it takes that this never happens again,” West Virginia Governor (now U.S. Senator) Joe Manchin III, said on April 11, 2010....
