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Predictable heartbreak at the Upper Big Branch Mine
By Lauren | April 7, 2010
Once, just once, I’d love to be able to tell the story of a company that, when confronted with safety violations by its regulators sometime in the last five years, brought in the right consultants, spent the necessary money to correct the problems, and became a model of good practice for the rest of its industry. Maybe someday that will happen. But it won’t be today, and it sure as heck won’t feature the Massey Energy Company that runs West Virginia’s Upper Big Branch coal mine.
Full disclosure: we don’t yet know what caused the explosions that killed at least twenty-five miners on Monday, and we probably won’t for some time. And yes, mining is dirty, dangerous, backbreaking work under the best of conditions. Some accidents are probably inevitable no matter how careful mining companies are. But to judge from news reports, the Upper Big Branch mine was hardly an industry model. According to NPR, Massey Energy paid $900,000 in fines last year alone. And according to mining safety and health consultant Ralph Christensen, quoted in today’s issue of National Underwriter’s Property & Casualty News, this mine’s list of safety violations was “‘way out of the realm,’” and included “‘unwarrantable failures … the ones that management knew about and should have taken care of.’”
Right now, I don’t know whether I’m more disgusted with Massey Energy’s management or the regulators who wrote up those “‘pages upon pages upon pages of violations’” that made Christensen so uncomfortable. How bad did things have to get before the regulators stopped writing lists and took real action? And why did Massey Energy continue operating the mine without addressing the “‘unwarrantable failures’” cited by its regulators?
This whole mess is all too familiar, and we can predict how it will probably end. There will be a highly publicized investigation. Witnesses will testify, tears will be shed, excuses will be made, and investigators will likely conclude that Massey Energy’s management cut corners to save money and the regulators weren’t tough enough about enforcing industry safety standards. New regulations will be written, a couple of people will be fired, the investigators and legislators will walk away feeling good about having “done something,” and that will be the end of the matter … until the next mining accident.
Wouldn’t it be better if mining companies took safety seriously without waiting for government regulators to make them do the right thing? No outside regulator can accomplish as much as conscientious self-regulation can. Yes, companies need to make a reasonable profit, but they don’t need to gouge every last penny, especially if doing so costs workers their lives. The mining industry is hardly alone in facing serious safety concerns. But if companies cared a little more about their people than their profit margins, we’d all be a lot better off.
Topics: Business Ethics, Corporate Governance, corporate responsibility, ethics |
May 3rd, 2010 at 10:51 am
great post as usual!