Workers Memorial Day – A Time to Mourn and Recommit
Today is Workers Memorial Day, a day set aside to remember all those who have lost their lives, were injured or became ill from their jobs.
At MSHA, our mission is to protect the health and safety of America’s miners, and we work hard at that every day. While we have much more work to do, we are making progress in our efforts to make mines safer and healthier for those who choose the occupation of a miner.
Last year, 44 miners went to work at our nation's mines and did not return home. There were 16 deaths at coal mines - the lowest number ever recorded. And there were 28 deaths at metal nonmetal mines – an increase of six from the previous year. MSHA is aggressively working to reverse that trend.
This morning, I joined colleagues at the Department of Labor, including from our sister agency, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA), to honor America’s fallen workers and renew our commitment to keep workers safe and healthy. We paused for a moment of silence to remember them and all victims of occupational accidents and illnesses.
Among the mining casualties of 2014 was James P. Crane, a truck driver who died at a sandstone mine in Pennsylvania when his truck went over a dump location which was not properly examined by the mine operator. He left behind a wife and three daughters. James Crane was one of 8 truck drivers who died in metal and nonmetal accidents last year.
Another preventable death from last year involved Arthur Gelentser, a 24-year-old continuous mining machine operator with 5 years of experience, who left behind a wife and two children when he was crushed between the end of the boom of a continuous mining machine and the side in an underground coal mine. His life could have been saved had a proximity detector been on the machine to stop it.
To that end, thanks to the work of the mining industry in developing the technology, we issued a new rule in January of this year requiring proximity detection equipment that will stop huge continuous mining machines before they crush a miner. Such accidents have claimed 30 lives since the mid-1980s.
Forty-five years ago, the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 went into effect. It was a tough worker health and safety law enacted when hundreds of coal miners were dying each year. Two hundred sixty died in 1970 alone. The Coal Mine Act has saved lives and coal mining deaths have dropped over the years to the lowest ever recorded in 2014 at 16.
The Coal Mine Act was amended by the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977 to include metal and nonmetal mines. As a result, deaths at these mines also dropped to historic lows until October of 2013, when we began seeing increases.
In 2009, we launched the End Black Lung - Act Now campaign aimed at ending this terrible disease, and to fulfill the promise of the 1969 Coal Mine Act. Since 1968, more than 76,000 miners have died and more than $45 billion in federal compensation has been paid to disabled coal miners and their survivors. Since the launch of the End Black Lung - Act Now campaign, respirable dust levels in coal mines have dropped steadily each year to historic lows.
Last year, as the culmination of our campaign, we published a landmark rule that lowers miners’ exposure to respirable coal dust. During the announcement of the rule I spoke of miners like Chester Fike, and a good friend Mike South, who both suffered and ultimately died from the disease, despite each having received a double lung transplant. This rule is necessary so other miners do not suffer as Chester and Mike did.
In the first eight months of the rule’s implementation, with over 41,000 respirable dust samples collected, we have seen about a 99% compliance rate. This is evidence that the rule is achievable.
Under the Mine Act, miners have the right to refuse to work in unsafe conditions. MSHA has used that law to give miners a stronger voice and send a strong message that the agency has miners’ backs when they are retaliated against for exercising those rights.
From 2010 through 2014, the Solicitor’s Office, following MSHA’s investigations, filed 185 cases for discrimination on behalf of affected miners and 157 motions for temporary reinstatement so those who lost their jobs could keep them while their claims of retaliation were being resolved. These are the highest number of actions ever filed by MSHA and SOL.
In April 2014, for example, we filed a temporary reinstatement motion on behalf of a dust collector operator who was suspended and terminated by a California cement company after he filed a hazard complaint. The company agreed to temporary economic reinstatement and ultimately to fully reinstate the miner and pay him his back wages.
To better protect workers MSHA has successfully implemented a number of strategic enforcement actions under the Mine Act. We are also using technology to improve compliance with some of the Mine Act’s requirements, including online tools that allow operators or miners to monitor a mine’s compliance history in several key areas. We are seeing positive results from these actions. Compliance by mine operators has improved and the number of chronic violators has significantly dropped. We are getting to troubled mines more quickly and, with the exception of the recent increases in metal and nonmetal fatalities, the industry has seen the lowest fatal and injury rates in history.
As we pause to remember miners who have lost their lives, or suffered injury or illness on the, job we must also look forward and do all that we can to ensure that miners go to work each day and return home safe and healthy at the end of their shifts. We owe miners that much!
4-28-2015