Massey Energy: Safety our top concern
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Massey Energy Co. Chairman and CEO Don Blankenship, second from left, attends a news conference with board directors, from left, Stanley Suboleski, Bobby Inman and Robert Foglesong at the Charleston Civic Center in Charleston, W.Va., Monday. U.S. Senate is expected to hold a hearing on the mine today. -
Massey chairman and CEO Don Blankenship at a press conference.
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CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Safety is the first priority at coal mines operated by Massey Energy Co. and anyone who thinks differently is flat-out wrong, officials of the Richmond, Va.,-based coal producer said bluntly Monday in their first news conference since the April 5 fatal underground explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine, the worst U.S. mining disaster in 40 years.
Speaking at the Charleston Civic Center, Massey chairman and CEO Don Blankenship said the explosion at the mine in Montcoal, W.Va., in which 29 miners were killed, "left us humbled and hurt and searching for answers," particularly since the company for two decades had "done our best to engineer dangers out of coal mining.
"As we move forward, the main thing is to make major improvement in correcting whatever allowed this explosion to occur."
Mr. Blankenship, whose management style and commitment to safety had been widely criticized since the fatal accident, said that Massey operates under the guidelines that "safety is job one, and production is job two."
He said Massey long has been committed to and innovative in safety "and anyone who suggests anything to contrary is totally wrong."
Board director Bobby R. Inman went even further, saying his sadness at the tragedy had at times been moved aside by anger at "this big lie" in media reports that "we traded off safety for profits." He said such allegations could be traced back initially to a lawyer for a plaintiff in a suit against Massey and subsequently to the president of the AFL-CIO, the head of the United Mineworkers, and then "sadly, the president of the United States."
Mr. Inman, a retired admiral and former head of the National Security Agency and deputy director of the CIA, said over the last five years the company has spent more than $45 million in safety improvements over and above what was required by federal and state law.
"If you were driving for profits over safety, that would have been the first thing to go," he said. "So I refer you back to who made the statements, what motivated them to this big lie."
First Published April 27, 2010 12:00 am
