Two recent reports highlight the failures of the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) in approving the retreat mining plans at Crandall Canyon mine in Utah that resulted in nine deaths after a mine collapse in August 2007. A third report criticizes MSHA's approval and implementation of emergency response plans required by legislation passed by Congress in the wake of mining disasters across the country in 2006.

The Aug. 6, 2007, mine collapse at the Crandall Canyon coal mine trapped six coal miners and led to the deaths of three rescue workers. The mine operators were working under a plan approved by MSHA in June 2007, just months after serious structural problems forced the operators to abandon a work area only 900 feet from where the miners were killed. The miners were engaged in "retreat mining" — cutting out the pillars of coal supporting the mountain above the main tunnel and allowing the roof to collapse — to extract the last significant coal deposits before abandoning the mine.

On March 6, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee released a report that addresses MSHA's approval of the plan to conduct retreat mining and its monitoring of the safety conditions during mining operations. The committee's investigation is detailed in its Report on the August 6, 2007 Disaster At Crandall Canyon Mine. The report concludes that MSHA and the mine operator, Murray Energy Corporation, did not exercise "appropriate care in formulating and reviewing the plans" for mining the pillars. Furthermore, MSHA entered into a tacit agreement with Murray Energy to excuse the company from some reporting requirements that should have led MSHA to conduct an investigation, a failure the report calls "an abdication of MSHA's regulatory responsibilities."

Specifically, MSHA either missed or dismissed critical technical flaws in the plan assembled by Murray's consultant, approved the plans with only minor changes, and ignored signals that should have made the agency cautiously review or investigate the mining operations. As a result of these "failures of diligence, care and oversight," the report concludes that the Secretary of Labor should refer the case to the Department of Justice for prosecution.

A report released March 31 by the Department of Labor's Office of Inspector General (OIG) was even more scathing than the HELP Committee report. The OIG was asked by HELP to conduct an audit of MSHA's performance of its plan review and implementation activities in the mine accident. Among the conclusions the report draws is that

MSHA was negligent in carrying out its responsibility to protect the safety of miners. Specifically, MSHA could not show that it made the right decision in approving the Crandall Canyon roof control plan. Similarly, the lack of documentation to support the review and approval of the plan prevented MSHA from showing that the process was free from undue influence by the mine operator.

MSHA's district offices are required to develop standard operating procedures that contain 20 minimum controls necessary for a plan approval process. MSHA's Washington, DC, headquarters is not required to review these operating procedures. The District 9 standard operating procedure, which regulates mining operations in most of the West, including Utah where the Crandall Canyon mine is located, did not address 12 of these 20 controls, which is the highest number of unaddressed controls among MSHA's district offices. In addition, each district office is required to develop its own procedure for reviewing roof control plans. According to the report, District 9 staff told the OIG that the plans are rarely if ever used except for training purposes.

The report offers nine specific recommendations to MSHA concerning rigorous processes and oversight, explicit criteria and guidance for assessing plans, and reevaluating districts' roof control plans. MSHA concurred with all the OIG recommendations but challenged the conclusion of negligence as "misleading." OIG investigators did not change their report in light of this objection. Instead, the report defends the conclusion: "MSHA's actions and inactions, taken as a whole, lead us to conclude that MSHA lacked care and attention in fulfilling its responsibilities to protect miners…These deficiencies evidence MSHA's serious and systemic lack of diligence in protecting miners, and we do not believe it is misleading to use the term 'negligent.'"

Emergency Response Plans

In the wake of 47 deaths in 2006 from mining accidents, Congress enacted the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act of 2006 (MINER Act) in an effort to improve the safety of coal mines. The MINER Act required coal mine operators to develop by August 2006 emergency response plans designed to improve accident preparedness and response. The mandates include providing oxygen sources to miners trapped underground and wireless communications systems.

The House Committee on Education and Labor asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to review "1) the effectiveness of MSHA's process for approving mines' emergency response plans, 2) the status of implementation of underground coal mines' emergency response plans, and 3) the efforts MSHA has made to enforce implementation of the plans and oversee enforcement and plan quality." GAO released its report April 8, which concluded that MSHA's directions to the industry were unclear, requiring MSHA to revise its guidance several times, resulting in widely varying plans across MSHA's districts.

Although most aspects of these emergency response plans had been implemented by January 2008, the requirements to have air refuges and capacity underground for trapped miners and to have wireless communications systems were not implemented. In the first instance, the manufacturers have not produced enough of the necessary equipment. Fully wireless technology does not yet exist, and MSHA has not determined what technology mining companies will be allowed to use to meet the law's requirements. The dangerous conditions exposed by the mine accidents in 2006 and by the Crandall Canyon mine incidents may not to be resolved by the law's June 2009 deadline.

District offices have been diligent in inspecting mines and issuing violations related to the parts of the emergency response plans companies have in place. However, GAO noted that a November 2007 OIG report indicated that there were too few resources to conduct all the inspections required. This finding was supported by GAO's interviews with district officials. In addition, officials at MSHA headquarters have not evaluated the citation data to determine if implementation and enforcement problems exist among the districts, so there may be very different standards applied to mines across the country. "As a result, all mines may not be prepared to adequately protect their miners in the event of an accident."