No.9: The 1968 Farmington Mine Disaster

Methane Madness

Methane Madness After a long downturn following World War II, coal was back in demand in 1968.1 Some of the industry’s biggest customers were public utilities that were stoking their plants with coal to produce electricity for homes and new businesses. Annual U.S. bituminous coal production reached 542 million tons, with 342 million tons coming from underground mines.2 Consol was the second largest coal producer in the United States; its mines yielding almost 50 million tons of coal a year. The No.9 accounted for almost 2 million tons of that total.3 In Marion County, West Virginia, coal mining and manufacturing created most of the income for some 60,000 people.4 Mechanization had changed the industry, but Consol’s No.9 mine still was sending 320 men underground each day. They were bringing out about 10,000 tons of coal each day, almost twice as much coal as 380 men did in 1954.5 The mine was much larger, too. Its tunnels ran beneath the 22 square miles between two small mining communities—Mannington and Farmington . Most No.9 miners lived in and around the two towns or in nearby Fairview, Rachel, Worthington, Barrackville, Owings, Shinnston or Fairmont , the county seat. Some miners were skilled and semiskilled union men, who grossed between $28 and $33 a day (adjusted for 2009 dollars, up to about $200 a day). Their salaried nonunion bosses earned more.6 Some union miners , particularly those with large families, struggled to meet their financial 6 METHANE MADNESS 43 obligations. In general, coal miners lived relatively quiet lives in the wooded folds of the Appalachian Mountains. They worked hard, went to church on Sundays, hunted, fished and spent time with their families. The turmoil in the outside world came to them mainly by way of newspaper headlines or television and radio newscasts. The Civil Rights Movement touched little of the population, which was 96 percent white. However,“placard-carrying Negroes”did picket Hartley’s downtown Fairmont department store one day in 1969. The police gave them one minute to stop the noise or keep moving. The chanting stopped immediately.7 The Vietnam War, however, was continuously front-page news. Some 1,400 Marion County residents served in Vietnam, and 28 of them lost their lives fighting the Viet Cong in the jungles of Southeast Asia.8 Still, the Hwy. 250 Hwy. 91 H w y . 1 8 H w y . 1 6 H w y. 15 Hwy. 1 Hwy. 11 H w y . 2 5 0 CONDIT MANNINGTON McCLELLAN RACHEL FARMINGTON Mahan Run Fan Llewellyn Run Portal and Fan Mods Run Fan Athas Run Portal and Fan Consol No.9 Slope Preparation Plant No.1 Fan Central Marion County, West Virginia 0 1 2 miles Central Marion County, West Virginia. Map by Rachel Davis. 44 CHAPTER 6 greatest and most constant threat to the rhythm of the Appalachian community was the mountain, should it turn against the men who entered it to take away the coal.. A Gassy Mine Methane gas was becoming more and more of a problem as No.9 miners pushed deeper into the mountain along the Main West Headings and into 7South. The mine was liberating about 8 million cubic feet of methane every 24 hours, more than double its 1954 rate of 3 million cubic feet.9 Even when the mine had adequate ventilation, the men had to check for methane frequently. In West Virginia, the law required all men operating continuous mining machines at the working faces to check for methane every 20 minutes. Testimony taken after the 1968 disaster indicated that some No.9 miners were not checking often enough. Dan Thomas, who ran a mining machine in A-Face, said he stopped to check for gas about seven times during an eight-hour afternoon shift.10 Joseph Duda, a mining machine operator who had been working in the No.9 for 26 years, said he checked for gas about every 30 minutes—sometimes more often and sometimes less often, depending on how the shuttle cars were running. “Do you know what the law is on gas examination?” an investigator asked him. “Well it’s about—no I don’t really—I don’t to be truthful about it,” Duda said.11 New Monitors Two of the No.9’s mining machines were equipped with methane monitors, which were relatively new at the...