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Tuesday, Oct 7, 2008
How Bush and his coal industry cronies are covering up one of the worst environmental disasters in U.S. history.
Nov 13, 2003 | There aren't many people in the United States who have as much experience with rock-and-earth dams and coal slurry impoundments as Jack Spadaro, a distinguished mining engineer who's been working in federal regulatory agencies for almost 30 years. That's why he was selected to be one of eight members of an accident investigation team to determine the causes of the nation's largest coal slurry spill at the Martin County Coal Company in Inez, Kt., on Oct. 11, 2000.
A coal slurry impoundment is a reservoir of thick liquid waste from coal processing that is constructed by damming the mouth of a valley with rock and earth. To residents living near these impoundments, they are disasters waiting to happen. The EPA called the Inez spill the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the Eastern United States. Far more extensive in damage than the widely known 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, the Martin County Coal slurry spill dumped an estimated 306 million gallons of toxic sludge down 100 miles of waterways.
Jack Spadaro has made it his life's work to figure out why these spills happen and how to stop them. But right now he is awaiting final word from officials at the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), a wing of the U.S. Department of Labor that is a lead regulatory agency for the coal industry, as to whether he will retain his job as the superintendent of the National Mine Safety and Health Academy, MSHA's training facility. His superiors are accusing him of a raft of misbehaviors -- including "abusing his authority" and "failing to follow instructions." But as far as he's concerned, the reason he's facing dismissal is very simple: He's been in hot water since January 2001 -- when Bush administration officials took control of the Martin County Coal investigation.
Before the change in political administration, Spadaro and his teammates had been uncovering information that had far-reaching implications for both Massey Energy (the parent company of Martin County Coal and a major contributor to the Republican Party) and the coal industry as a whole. Testimony and documents revealed that executives at Martin County Coal and federal regulators were aware that there was potential for a catastrophic failure at the slurry impoundment but didn't take proper actions to avoid it. In particular, an MSHA engineer had made a list of specific safety recommendations to Martin County Coal and MSHA district officials following a 100-million gallon spill in May 1994. But MSHA and Martin not only largely ignored the recommendations, MSHA actually allowed Martin to add coal waste to its impoundment.
By the end of 2000, Spadaro and other investigation team members felt they were beginning to collect enough evidence to issue Massey Energy citations for willful and criminal negligence. In addition, it looked as though their own agency, MSHA, was going to be held accountable as well. But that all changed when George W. Bush moved into the White House. Within days of Bush's inauguration a new team leader was brought in to head the Martin County Coal investigation. The scope of the investigation was dramatically narrowed -- offering yet another dramatic example of how the wholesale takeover of the White House by the energy industry is having a real impact on real lives, not just on the whistle-blowers like Jack Spadaro but on the people he's trying to protect.
On April 3, 2001, Spadaro tendered his resignation from the accident investigation team and filed a complaint with the Department of Labor's Office of the Inspector General, alleging that Bush administration officials were obstructing the team's work. Spadaro also spoke out publicly when MSHA released its final accident investigation report in October 2002, which cited Martin County Coal for two minor violations with fines totaling $110,000, and left MSHA district officials completely off the hook.
Spadaro was placed on administrative leave -- often a bureaucratic precursor to job termination -- on June 4, 2003. He was called away on business to Washington, D.C., that day and federal officials took the opportunity to raid his Beckley, W.V. office. They searched through his personal belongings, dismantled the frame of a family portrait to look behind the photograph, and changed the locks. Officials in D.C. questioned him about providing free academy housing to an instructor who had multiple sclerosis. Spadaro says he was dumbfounded by the questions since MSHA officials, including some of his questioners, were aware of the arrangement, which was, in any case, within Spadaro's authority to grant.
Spadaro could be terminated any day. The apparent vendetta against him, and a mass of other evidence including damning off-the-record comments by officials involved in the investigation and a heavily-redacted report, raise serious questions as to whether Bush administration officials, ranging from mining safety officials all the way to Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, orchestrated a coverup to whitewash Martin County Coal of any serious responsibility for the coal slurry disaster.
There are about 700 slurry impoundments in the United States. Nearly 200 of them are built over underground mines, as is the Martin County Coal impoundment. Plans for building one of the biggest slurry impoundments ever constructed are also under way.
These waste facilities, though little known, have one of the greatest potentials for catastrophic environmental disaster in the country.
On Feb. 26, 1972, a slurry dam gave way at the Buffalo Mining Company in Logan County, W.V., releasing a giant wave of thick, murky water, choked with chemicals, coal refuse, rocks and dirt. According to the official accident report, 132 million gallons of slurry suddenly flooded the Buffalo Creek Valley floor, destroying or partially destroying 17 communities. 125 people were killed. 4,000 people were left homeless.
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