Miners' survivors plead for safety bill

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070216/NEWS0101/702160432

Miners' survivors plead for safety bill
But action is uncertain during short session

By R. G. Dunlop
[e-mail]
The Courier-Journal

FRANKFORT, Ky. -- Despite pleas yesterday from the widows of dead miners, a bill to strengthen state mine-safety laws appears to be in serious jeopardy during this year's General Assembly.

With the session nearly half over, the bill hasn't had so much as a hearing -- much less a vote -- in committee.

Rep. Jim Gooch, the Providence Democrat who is chairman of the House Natural Resources and Environment Committee, assured the family members and others who attended a meeting yesterday that he is committed to reducing coal-mining fatalities, 16 of which occurred in Kentucky last year.

But Gooch also said he wants to give changes made in the law last year a chance to work. And he added that he isn't sure there is enough time in a 30-day session to take thoughtful action on the issue.

The widows were unmoved by any of those arguments.

"If 16 of you all were killed last year, do you think there would be no change?" asked Melissa Lee, whose husband, Jimmy, was one of five victims of a methane explosion in May at the Darby No. 1 mine in Harlan County.

"Do miners not mean anything? Are they not important? Please don't turn your backs on us just because you don't know what mining is like."

Gooch said family members' testimony on the bill, which has been assigned to his committee, was not on yesterday's agenda because he did not learn until Wednesday night that they were going to be present.

Also attending the meeting was Paul Ledford, the lone survivor of the Darby explosion.

Ledford and the others told the committee in quiet but emotional tones how various aspects of the bill, including a requirement that all miners be equipped with detectors to warn of potentially explosive levels of methane, might help prevent mining deaths.

Stella Morris, whose husband, David "Bud" Morris, bled to death at an underground mine in Harlan County in December 2005 after a loaded coal-hauling vehicle severed his legs, sat at the witness table with a photo of him and their son, Landen.

She stressed the importance of a provision in the bill that would require two emergency medical technicians to be on duty at all times, with at least one of them being underground.

Under current law, only one trained medical technician must be on duty, and not underground.

Mine safety advocate Tony Oppegard said Bud Morris would be alive today had he received proper medical attention.

In discussing the bill, Gooch said he is concerned that some provisions would have what he called a "high fiscal impact."

One such provision calls for increasing required annual mine inspections from three to four and also specifies two electrical inspections per year. Current law does not require electrical inspections to be made on any particular schedule, and some mines go without them for months or more.

Johnny Greene, executive director of the state Office of Mine Safety and Licensing, told the committee that the state is training new inspectors hired to meet the increased demands of last year's law, which increased the number of mandatory annual inspections to three, from two.

FULL story at link.