A review by the Department of Labor has found that federal mine safety regulators may have improperly excluded more than 10 coal mines with a recent history of safety and health violations from inspections.
In a memorandum, the labor department’s inspector general noted that a 2009 Mine Safety and Health Administration order told inspectors to limit their candidate mines to one per field office and three per district, in an effort to save resources.
“This instruction set a limit that was inappropriate for this enforcement program,” the memo said.
The MSHA compiled a list of the most dangerous safety offenders but then proceeded to remove 21 mines from its initial list of 89 violators. At least 10 of the mines removed were known to have a recent history of violations.
“It’s clear that we need to scrap the current system and put a new system in place that is focused on protecting miners’ safety and health,” Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said in a statement.
Federal mine safety inspections have been under scrutiny since an April 5 explosion killed 29 men at Massey Energy Co.’s Upper Big Branch coal mine in West Virginia. Six months prior to the blast, a computer error missed eight previous citations at the mine, the Associated Press reports. MSHA would have given the operator 90 days to improve safety at the mine had it been aware of the citations.
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