Hughes Creek, West Virginia residents evacuated due to potential mine blowout. This is bad.

[greatlaurel]

http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20150313/GZ01/150319472/1419

"BELLE, W.Va. -- Residents in the Hughes Creek community in eastern Kanawha County were being asked to leave their homes late Friday night due to a potential mine blowout.

The state Department of Environmental Protection said in a statement that there were 150 homes affected by the “voluntary evacuation”; only a few homes were near the mine, according to DEP, but roads to the others could be covered by water and debris and cut off from emergency services. "

"He said a blowout occurs when the water forces open the seals on a mine. He said he had heard the mine was last being used as a sludge storage area, though he didn’t have further details immediately available. "

This will be another terrible environmental disaster thanks to the coal mining industry. I hope it does not blow out completely. The coal industry leaves nothing behind but environmental destruction, poverty and death.

Cross posted from the Appalachia Group.

[malaise]

1. Do the people of West Virginia ever get a break from these criminal coal miners

and their bought politicians

[tularetom]

2. Actually they seem to display a remarkable tolerance for them

Since they keep electing the politicians who are in the pocket of the coal miners.

Although they have to know what the miners are doing to their air, water, safety, health and general quality of life.

[malaise]

8. You have a point

[underpants]

9. Coal is king in District 12

Er I mean West Virginia. Money works and "Friends of Coal" has tons of it.

[A Little Weird]

19. True but

The problem is that the politicians of both parties are in the pocket of the coal companies.

[barbtries]

20. i think it's also because it's the only game in town.

coal is what hurts them and is the only source of their livelihood. no other way to make a living.

[Algernon Moncrieff]

24. Coal has provided jobs there for generations

Our efforts to end the Coal era need to be combined with a Marshall Plan type economic reshaping of WV, KY, Western PA, and Western VA. The problems are that the money to do that isn't present, and Appalachia would need to fight the Rust Belt cities for who is in greater need of an economic makeover.

[malokvale77]

34. The current legislation in West Virginia...

just tossed a bill from the last legislation, that would have provided for new industry in alternative and renewable energy.

I have a good friend there who's father died young from working in the coal mines, their land was destroyed by coal mining, and her water was recently poisoned by chemicals from the coal industry. You would think that would be enough to convince her of the dangers of the coal industry.

Nope, she is convinced that coal is the savior of WV.

[Algernon Moncrieff]

36. Yeah....no

Trains were once wood fired; then they were coal fired; now they are diesel fired.

If we must go with a fossil fuel, NG is --on balance -- less damaging to the environment than coal. Wind is renewable, clean, and is just about profitable without any sort of subsidy.

[greatlaurel]

3. No and they keep voting the corrupt politicians who kowtow to coal over and over again.

I cry for West Virginia (and Ohio). What a mess. The people and the land are abused. There is an analogy with abused wives who keep coming back to their abuser in there somewhere.

Check out Ken Ward, Jr.'s Coal Tattoo blog.

Governor Tomblin is supposed to be a Democrat, too.

http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2015/03/13/shocked-that-tomblin-sided-with-coal-lobby/

"A funny thing happened as this year’s West Virginia legislative session comes to an end … Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin had a choice between siding with coal miners and coal operators, and he went with the operators."

Thanks for your post.

[ananda]

7. Yet they keep voting them in.

The fear of not working trumps everything it seems

[OldRedneck]

17. Add to that the fear of . . .

-- The black man in the White House
-- Muslims
-- Immigrants
-- Uppity women
-- Gays
-- Gun-grabbers
-- Liberals

Big Coal may destroy our mountains, poison our streams, crush our wells, kill us -- but we get to keep our guns and Bibles.

[onethatcares]

29. I think it's the fear

of not eating that trumps everything there.

It's not like West Virginia is a leader in solar technology, or cancer treatment centers.

My folks were from a coal mining community in Pennsylvania and my uncles and aunts had a
peculiar way of looking at things.

[greatlaurel]

4. It is an odd thing, but I have met many coal miners. They are some of the best people on the planet.

The coal mine operators and owners are some of the most corrupt and heartless men and women I have ever met. They are scary people who seem more like gangsters than business people.

[Jackpine Radical]

5. Coal miners were once at the forefront of American labor's battles.

They fought and bled to secure better lives for themselves and their children.

What happened? I understand the need for a job, but surely the miners of 80 and 100 years ago were even more desperate.

Somehow, the Republicans have managed to turn labor upon itself. People are deathly afraid to inconvenience the "job creators." They will consign themselves and their children to early graves as part of the "externalized costs" of energy production rather than rising against their exploiters.

[underpants]

11. A majority of coal miners are no longer Union

They have broken the UMW hold with a very concerted and well financed effort over the last 40 years. Really since day one and Blair Mountain

[Doctor_J]

13. hate radio happened.

Am radio feeds their fear of non whites, government, and"gun grabbers" to the point where they would rather risk their lives than vote for a democrat. Brain washing.

[Enthusiast]

16. +1!

[appalachiablue]

31. Indeed, the rise of Hate Media in the last 30 years and Reaganism have had profound influence.

[appalachiablue]

32. Reaganism, Friedmanomics, free market crime, globalization, Hate Media. Coal miner child.

[Snarkoleptic]

6. "sludge storage area"

I suspect that's corporate-speak for toxic waste dump.

[calimary]

10. I would actually call the republi-CON Congress that.

THEY are a major "sludge storage area" for sure.

[Doctor_J]

12. is this "clean coal"?

Best of luck to the miners and the locals.

[greatlaurel]

25. Coal sludge is created by the coal washing process which is used to create the mythical "clean coal"

Thanks for your post.

[hollowdweller]

14. God is punishing us here in WV for voting republican.

Nobody here on the forums has been covering it but we have a new wingnut legislature that is going wild.

[appalachiablue]

30. WV was a blue state, solid for decades from the 1930s to 1980s as you know. Homes had pictures of

FDR and John L. Lewis of UMWA on the walls. The rise of Reagan, RW Hate Radio has had much impact.

[OldRedneck]

15. Buffalo Creek

Is this Buffalo Creek all over? Again?

[greatlaurel]

21. Great post, I remember the Buffalo Creek disaster. It was sickening.

The coal companies have dumped coal slurry/coal sludge all over mining country. I know of an abandoned coal slurry pit that sits up on a hillside that is going to slide one of these days. It has millions of tons of coal sludge left from a coal washing facility. There have been several small slides since it was closed. They have managed to put a little top soil on top of it and it looks sort of green from the hardy grass, but it is a deadly site just waiting to the correct weather conditions to slide into the valley.

Buffalo Creek was a storage area for the coal slurry left over from a strip mine. From what I read, it appears Hughes Creek is being impacted from an abandoned deep mine that had coal slurry pumped into it for disposal. Here in Ohio, a deep mine flooded after the operators punctured a wall separating the new mine from an old abandoned mine. The mine was flooded, but did not impact the nearby creek. AEP and the mine owners wanted the mine pumped out the OhioEPA caved in to the corporations. They pumped out the mine into the local creek, destroyed the creek which has never recovered. The corporations abandoned the coal mine. They had the locals convinced they would reopen the mine and save their jobs if they were allowed to destroy the creek Of course, the corporation lied, they abandoned the mine. The locals lost their job and their previously healthy creek, that was nice enough that they could have created tourist jobs. Not now. Coals companies leave nothing behind but destruction, poverty and death.

[SoapBox]

18. It'll be crickets from the impotent mass media.

[Algernon Moncrieff]

22. Update

As of 11:30 Eastern (today) they are drilling/looking for a borehole to determine how much water is in the mine.

http://www.wowktv.com/story/28493319/resident-of-hughes-creek-are-being-bused-out-due-to-possible-mine-blow-out

[greatlaurel]

23. Thanks for the update!

Good luck to all the folks impacted by this abandoned mine.

[Algernon Moncrieff]

33. Mine Stabilized. Evacuation Cancelled (Good News!)

HUGHES CREEK, WV -
UPDATE 2:54 PM SATURDAY

Families evacuated from the Hughes Creek area are starting to return to their homes, according to the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection.

The DEP said conditions have stabilized in the area.

The flow of water from the old coal mine has returned to about the same rate as before the heavy rains Friday.

http://www.wowktv.com/story/28493319/resident-of-hughes-creek-are-being-bused-out-due-to-possible-mine-blow-out

[greatlaurel]

35. Thanks for the update. I hope the DEP stays on top of this situation.

The risk from the mine is still there if there is another huge rainfall. Good luck to the residents!

[packman]

26. Mine blow out?

never heard of it. Can only imagine the earth literally exploding.

[greatlaurel]

27. Blow outs from abandoned coal mines are not uncommon. The closed mines are supposed to be sealed.

The seals are put in place to keep people out and water from draining out uncontrolled. The water that comes out of abandoned mines is incredibly contaminated. When there is too much pressure from the water draining out of the mine the seals are forced open by the water pressure.

Coal country is full of old mines, many never sealed properly or have had the seals blown.

[ColesCountyDem]

28. This stuff is what makes people in Ilinois' coal country crazy.

Following the December 1951 Orient #2 mine disaster, Illinois completely revamped it's mine-safety rules, the strictest in the nation for the last 63 years. Illinois also made the proper storage and disposition of mine waste a priority, making Illinois the state with the strictest environmental regulations in the nation. Additionally, Southern Illinois University and Eastern Illinois University also developed processes whereby coal can be burned in such a manner so as to eliminate the discharge of particulate matter and the sulfur compounds that cause acid rain. Finally, there are more easily recoverable BTU's of coal of the same or better grade in southern IL than there are in either WV or KY, recoverable with fewer environmental 'down sides'.

The reason that these things continue to happen in WV (and KY) is simple-- it costs less and makes HUGE profits for the coal companies, more than they could make mining Illinois coal. If we are to continue using coal as a 'bridge fuel', we should mine it in places where it can be done as safely as possible and with as little worker-injury of environmental damage as possible, and that is in southern Illinois.

This is why laid-off miners here get crazy when they hear stories like this out of WV!



#rantoff