Afterword
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.
—Martin Luther King Jr.
One Saturday in November, I looked up from an ultimate frisbee game in Anacostia Park to spot a bald eagle. The park lies upstream from Old Town Alexandria, where the Potomac River splits and straddles the downtown area of the nation’s capital.
“The power plant along the river developed a bald eagle nesting program to boost their environmental creds,” I told a friend. “Maybe that’s one of their birds.”
Five days after the eagle sighting on Thanksgiving Day, I had the worst asthma attack I’ve experienced in seven years after playing twenty minutes of ultimate frisbee. I called for two friends to carry me off the field after a half an hour of trying to walk back home had left me twenty feet from the sidelines of the game, sitting in a mud puddle. Three days later, I parked a block from the Potomac River Generating Station, now owned by GenOn, a company created by the merger of Mirant and RRI Energy in April 2010. I scuttled along the railroad track with my camera, looking for a good shot and hoping that nobody would confront me for snooping.
The five squat smokestacks were barely visible from my worm’s-eye view, and airplanes zoomed overhead every few minutes. I climbed a small hill opposite the plant and focused my lens. I leaned against a fence that separated the railroad track from an apartment complex. The switch from residential to industrial felt too sudden; townhouses lay within fifty feet of the plant’s open pile of coal. As I took pictures, bikers and runners passed on the path that curves around the plant along the river. I had taken pictures when I visited the plant before, but it seemed appropriate to return—on August 30, 2011, GenOn agreed with the City of Alexandria to close the Potomac River plant by October 1, 2012, signaling the end of an era.
With the Pepco lines in, the DOE no longer deemed the plant necessary for the capital’s electrical redundancy. The City of Alexandria will surrender the $32 million held in escrow for environmental improvements after the 2008 settlement and has pledged to help GenOn find work for the 120 plant employees who will lose their jobs.
Even before GenOn announced the plant’s closure, the nonprofit American Clean Skies Foundation proposed plans for redeveloping the twenty-five-acre site. The venture, named Potomac River Green, includes office, retail, hotel, and residential space, as well as several unique features: a Clean Energy Enterprise Center, an Energy Museum of twenty-first-century alternatives, and a compressed natural gas and electrical car refueling station. The bikers and runners will still enjoy recreational space, with an eco-trail extending into nearby Dangerfield Island. Plans include reusing the plant’s brick and steel in the rebuilding process.
In response to an online Washington NBC article announcing the closure, Sandra Wheeler wrote,
So happy to hear the news—the coal fired Pepco facility is closing its doors permanently in Alexandria! I was diagnosed with COPD [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease] after living a few blocks from this facility for 10 years! Oddly, since moving, no more issues with breathing, even with living in allergy burdened Eastern North Carolina. Doctors here have declared no COPD.
The most common cause of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is smoking, but pollution and frequent exposure to smoke are also common causes. There is no documented cure. During 2010, the Potomac River Generating Station emitted 1.1 million tons of CO2, 1,145 tons of NOx, and 1,400 tons of SO2. In spring 2011, the State of Virginia fined the plant $275,000 in civil penalties for emissions violations. The plant’s closure is truly a triumph for the City of Alexandria and the health of its residents. On learning the news, I felt amazed and delighted, but I also experienced a tinge of regret. Despite my own struggles with asthma, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for Lynwood Reid, the kind operations team manager who had served as my guide on the plant tour. A city took on a corporation and won, but Alexandria is a city of affluence. GenOn will continue to operate, and 120 blue-collar energy workers will struggle to find employment in a depressed economy.
Rarely do company executives pay the price for our energy. Public opinion is set against Robert Murray and Don Blankenship, but as of this writing no material punishment has been levied for their involvement in the some of the greatest mining tragedies of our time.
In July 2010, four foremen of the Massy owned Aracoma Mine received criminal convictions for their safety violation of failing to conduct escapeway drills. This might have prevented the deaths of the two miners who got lost in the fire. In response to a web article on the topic in the Charleston (WV) Gazette, several readers made comments. Don wrote, “Sad to say this, but it’s probable that they were all doing what they needed to keep their jobs. Somehow, the real culprits never get called to account for their misdeeds.” Monty followed, “Reading through all of these stories, one gets the impression that while these men were doing things they probably knew they shouldn’t have been doing, they were also sacrificial lambs.” Daniel R. Cobb finished with, “Fines? Only fines? Does anyone ever go to prison?”
In October 2011, Hughie Stover, the safety director at the Upper Big Branch mine, the Massey operation where twenty-nine miners died in April 2010, was convicted of lying to federal investigators and ordering the destruction of records. He denied that Massey had a policy of tipping off foremen when federal investigators arrived for surprise inspections, a testimony challenged by that of mine guards who delivered the tips through an established and sophisticated system of radios, walkie-talkies, and strobe lights. For this offense, Stover could serve up to twenty-five years in prison.
Five months later, mining superintendent Gary May was charged with conspiracy to defraud the government, which carries a potential sentence of five years in prison. May’s subversive activities included rigging the ventilation system to trick safety officials and disabling a methane monitor on a cutting machine. On February 23, 2012, the day after May was charged, West Virginia Office of Miners Health Safety and Training released its report on the Upper Big Branch mine disaster, citing 253 violations for which it could fine the company up to nearly a million dollars in penalties. The state investigation upheld that the cause of the explosion was an improperly maintained cutting machine, which sparked a small pocket of methane gas, which ignited an excess build up of coal dust, which clogged and malfunctioning water sprayers were unable to extinguish. News reports have hinted at May’s intentions to plea bargain for a lower sentence in exchange for information. US Attorney Booth Goodwin in charge of inspections indicated his probe was “absolutely not” finished, possibly indicating his aims go beyond May’s prosecution to former Massey executives.
May is the highest level mining employee ever charged in a criminal case, but the conviction of a fellow miner, however culpable, is not what the families of the victims of the Upper Big Branch explosion and the Aracoma fire are really after. Aracoma widows Delorice Bragg and Freda Hatfield want to see Blankenship behind bars. After the foremen were convicted in the Aracoma case, the widows’ lawyer stood and read a statement: “US Attorney Goodwind must tell Congress now … why the law is insufficient to pursue all persons responsible for such blatantly criminal and deadly conditions.” Patty Quarles, whose son Gary died in the Upper Big Branch mine, expressed a similar sentiment, “Somebody called the shots, and I don’t think these section bosses and mine foremen can be held accountable alone. It goes higher than that. It goes all the way up the ladder to Blankenship … He needs to pay for what he’s done.” After West Virginia released its report on the Upper Big Branch accident, Jack Bowden, father-in-law of deceased miner Steve Harrah, expressed his relief that the criminal investigation was still progressing. He had no qualms about sharing his hopes for its outcome, “It was murder, basically. Don Blankenship should be held accountable.”
Don Blankenship had a reputation for micromanaging his mines, and at Upper Big Branch in particular, he required miners to fax him production reports every half hour. Blankenship has a long record in West Virginia for underhanded and reckless mining practices, but the Upper Big Branch disaster opened him up to wider scrutiny. In December 2010, Rolling Stone published an article dubbing Blankenship “the Dark Lord of Coal Country.” A week later, reportedly from pressure from the firm’s board of directors, Blankenship retired and disappeared from public view. His generous retirement package included twelve million dollars in cash, insurance, an office and a secretary, access to Massey’s documents in case of future litigation, and a 1965 blue Chevrolet. In June 2011, Massey Energy shareholders approved the company’s sale to Alpha Natural Resources.
The fate of Bob Murray and Murray Energy still hangs in the balance. Criminal investigations by the US Attorney’s Office of Utah into the Crandall Canyon disaster drag on, which may make it more difficult to accurately assess blame. J. David McAteer, former assistant secretary of MSHA, expressed his opinion, backed by years of experience in mining safety: “It’s a shame, just a damned shame … Unfortunately, it suggests that in the end, it will peter out. The longer these things go, the more likely they are to be resolved without prosecution. That’s an accepted fact in criminal work or civil matters.”
Investigations focus heavily on the general manager of Crandall Canyon, Laine Adair, and his possible concealment and false representation of hazardous conditions. Representative George Miller, senior Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee, wrote the following to his fellow committee members: “Adair and others at [Murray Energy] may have purposefully misled MSHA about the severity of the March bump fearing MSHA would close the mine, and [they] continued to adhere to the mischaracterization after the August incidents.” Miller’s reference to “others” may very well hint at Robert Murray, owner of Murray Energy.
• • •
The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice. On the fortieth anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, then Senator Barack Obama added to King’s statement: “It bends towards justice, but here is the thing: it does not bend on its own. It bends because each of us in our own ways put our hand on that arc and we bend it in the direction of justice.” Recent events confirm this assertion, and not only in cities like Alexandria, Virginia. Persistent grassroots action and the courage of private citizens to take their grievances against corporations to the courts have begun to bear fruit in many small towns in rural West Virginia.
In 2009, three years after Ed Wiley’s march to Washington, D.C. for the Pennies for Promise Campaign, Senator Byrd finally took action, publically criticizing Massey for refusing to donate funds to rebuild Marsh Fork Elementary School in Sundial, West Virginia. In March 2010, Don Blankenship folded, promising $1 million to the $10.7 million project (Alpha Natural Resources increased the donation to $1.5 million). Coal River Mountain Watch, a local environmental organization, donated $10,000. In April 2010, Charles Annenberg Weingarten of the Annenberg Foundation visited Appalachia when he heard about the Upper Big Branch explosion, learned of the children’s precarious situation, and donated $2.5 million from his family’s organization to supplement other private donations and the funds from West Virginia’s School Building Authority and the Raleigh County School Board.
The following is taken from a website announcing the Annenberg donation: “Led by the residents of the Coal River Valley, supported by environmental, community, and human rights groups and celebrities, the ‘powers that be’ were no match against dedicated and persistent people. WAY TO GO EVERYONE. When the history of the movement against mountaintop removal is written, the victory at Marsh Fork will be remembered as a key moment. Celebrate … celebrate … power to the people!”
On April 30, 2010, an informal coalition of environmentalists and community members gathered at Ed Wiley’s house for “roasted pork butt and wild turkey” served with potato salad. A year and a half later, on October 6, 2011, two hundred elementary school children wearing yellow hardhats sang at a groundbreaking ceremony attended by their parents and various dignitaries. Three miles from the current location of Marsh Fork Elementary School, construction is set to finish in December 2012 on a new, energy-efficient, red brick facility.
After seven years of litigation over the toxic slurry that leaked into city aquifers in Rawl, West Virginia, 769 people received compensation for gastrointestinal disorders, cancers, and learning disorders caused by lead and other heavy metal poisoning. The 350 lawsuits were settled on July 27, 2011, in a confidential hearing at the Kanawha County Courthouse; soon after, the figure of thirty-five million dollars was leaked to the press.
The families of Jackie Weaver, Marshall Winans, Tom Anderson, Jesse Jones, Jerry Groves, and George “Junior” Hamner received wrongful death settlements on November 16, 2011, for the mining explosion at Sago. Six other families had already received compensation, and Martin Toler’s family declined to sue. ICG, the company operating Sago Mine at the time of the disaster, has been acquired by Arch Coal. Lawyer Al Karlin, who represented four of the families, expressed the following: “This is a somber moment. When a case like this is settled, it’s too easy to forget what it was all about. No settlement can really resolve what the families are left with—the holes in their lives.”
In spite of safety legislation prompted by the Sago Mine disaster, more egregious safety violations contributed to the deaths of a total of forty individuals in the Aracoma, Crandall Canyon, and Upper Big Branch mining disasters. Karlin continued, “In some ways [safety conditions] are better today, but in some ways we’re still facing the problems of safety in coal mines.”
In West Virginia and across the US, the names Massey Energy and ICG will forever be associated with catastrophe. Now under the ownership of Alpha Natural Resources and Arch Coal respectively, perhaps these mines will use the distance from these names to make a distinct departure from the past in their company values. Immediately after buying out Massey, Alpha Natural Resources launched a “Running Right” safety program, training 7,500 miners. On December 6, 2011, the company agreed to pay $210 million in a settlement with federal prosecutors for the Upper Big Branch Mine accident, including payments to the families for wrongful deaths, money for mining safety research, and funds to clear Massey’s unresolved fines with MSHA. This protects Alpha Natural Resources from further liability as a corporation, but it doesn’t protect individuals associated with the cause of the explosion from criminal prosecution.
Despite appropriate financial compensation, there is one man with whom coal miners and citizens in many rural towns in West Virginia have yet to settle a score.
Alpha’s settlement for the Upper Big Branch explosion once more drew the media’s view toward Don Blankenship, and journalists have uncovered an alarming development. Only a month after stepping down as CEO of Massey Energy, Blankenship filled out paperwork for the McCoy Coal Group Inc. of Belfry, Kentucky. The company, bearing the maiden name of Blankenship’s mother, has yet to seek a permit, but its establishment signals his only too clear intention of making a return to the mining industry. I find it noteworthy that Blankenship has picked a location in Appalachia, where mining laws are least enforced, for his comeback.
Phil Smith, the brawny and articulate spokesman for the UMWA, did not mince words on hearing the news: “Don Blankenship belongs in jail, not in a position to put yet more miners’ lives at risk.” In 2011, after concluding its investigations of the Upper Big Branch disaster, the UMWA designated Massey “a rogue corporation” and its actions, “industrial homicide.” MSHA likewise determined that the responsibility for the Upper Big Branch explosion was a direct result of Massey’s “systematic, intentional, and aggressive efforts” to hide unsafe working conditions—to the extent that managers kept two sets of inspection books, an accurate one for the mine and a falsified one for regulators.
The Federal Coal Mine Safety Act of 1952, the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969, the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977, and the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act of 2006 have all extended the power of the federal government to protect miners and to take legal action against mines that perpetuate unsafe working conditions. The families who lost their loved ones in the Aracoma, Upper Big Branch, and Crandall Canyon mines now wait for federal investigators to take the next historic step: holding a company executive personally responsible for the institutionalized disregard for human life.