The Massey Energy Mine Explosion
In April 2010, just days before the Deepwater Horizon disaster, an explosion at a coal mine in West Virginia killed 29 miners. The disaster was partially as a result of high methane levels in the unventilated mine. In the years after the explosion, a state investigation said the owner of the mine, Massey Energy, squarely to blame, alleging that the company “operated its mines in a profoundly reckless manner, and 29 coal miners paid with their lives for the corporate risk taking.”
Company executives were later charged with conspiracy to thwart mine safety inspections; Don Blankenship, then-CEO of Massey, a regular climate denier, and at the time the highest-paid CEO in the coal industry, was later sentenced to a year in prison. Blankenship has since made multiple failed attempts to run for office, and labeled Sen. Mitch McConnell “Cocaine Mitch” for some reason. (Narcos crossover, anyone?) There’s no story that better encapsulates how America’s coal boom benefited executives while putting workers at risk than this one.
