By Stephanie Taylor
It took Wanda Blevins 13 years to stop being angry. (click here)
Those men, burned and injured, went for help. At 5:45 p.m., they reached an area where they were able to telephone the surface control operations room to report the explosion and roof collapse....
Angry at her husband for dying long before her. Angry that the world moved on so soon after he and 12 others lost their lives 2,140 feet underground in North America’s deepest coal mine.
The series of explosions that killed 13 men in Jim Walter Resources Mine No. 5 on Sept. 23, 2001, happened less than two weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. It was the deadliest mining accident in the U.S. in 17 years, but didn’t receive much attention beyond Tuscaloosa County in the aftermath of the attacks....
...David Blevins was one of the 32 miners who descended into Blue Creek Mine No. 5 that Sunday afternoon to perform routine maintenance. Around 5:20 p.m., an explosion occurred in Section 4, an area in the outer reaches of the eight-square mile mine where the men were working to shore up a roof.
Minutes before the first explosion, water began to pour steadily from the roof while small rocks and steel bolts began fall. The miners were retreating when a slab of rock fell and hit a large battery charging station. The spark ignited the built-up methane gas, causing a blast that pinned Gaston Adams, 56, under a rock and threw three other miners.
Those men, burned and injured, went for help. At 5:45 p.m., they reached an area where they were able to telephone the surface control operations room to report the explosion and roof collapse....
