Vol. 71/No. 32      September 3, 2007

If you listen closely to Mr. [Robert] Murray’s comments, especially the first days, you’ll hear the words of someone who’s lived in his own world for quite a while and is used to having everything his way, going as far as telling the press what to print and prohibiting the families from talking to them. If at the end of the day some good comes out of exposing Crandall and all the other mine operations for what they’ve been getting away with for so long, we’ll all be better off for it.

Richard Wening
Newcastle, Utah

Unions and mine safety II
A temporary worker works with me at a steel mill in Washington, Pennsylvania that’s organized by the Steelworkers Local 7139-05. He has worked as a long hole driller in many states at underground and surface mines. In August 2006, this worker met Murray at one of his safety meetings, while working at the Galatia mine in Galatia, Illinois. This safety meeting, the worker said, felt more to him like a production meeting. For example, each shift was compared to the shift before, production-wise. He said he saw many unsafe practices in this mine. Earlier in 2006, this worker was a long hole driller at the Dugout Canyon mine in Utah.

My coworker said that when he first heard that Murray was saying an earthquake caused the entrapment, his first reaction was that this was a lie.

This worker said that he always saw how the union mines are the safest. It is easier for the coal companies to pay the fines, he said, than to repair safety violations. He said that MSHA is a government operation, and he thinks that Bush gives MSHA too much leeway. He feels that the fines are way too cheap, and need to be much higher.

He ended our conversation by saying he was glad to hear that someone was doing something around here to get the word out about the miners in Huntington. He volunteered to order his own bundle of Militants to get to coal miners he knows in the area from his drilling time at the mines in this region.

Josefina Otero
Washington, Pennsylvania

Want to write miners’ families
We live in Bass Lake, Indiana. Not a day has gone by that we have not offered prayers for the missing miners and the people waiting for the rescue. We have been deeply affected by this sad incident.

I would like to write a letter to Bob Murray, the owner of the mine. And, I would like to send a letter to the families and friends of the people waiting. Would you be so kind as to send me an address to enable me to send cards of hope and faith.

Bea Zahn
Bass Lake, Indiana

[Editor’s note: You can contact the United Mine Workers union in the area at UMWA District 22, 525 East 100 South, Price, UT 84501; tel.: (435) 637-2037, to find how to send correspondence to the miners’ families.]

The letters column is an open forum for all viewpoints on subjects of interest to working people. Please keep your letters brief. Where necessary they will be abridged. Please indicate if you prefer that your initials be used rather than your full name.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home