Massey Energy's Don Blankenship "symbolized lethal greed"

Massey Energy president Don Blankenship has become Dirty Energy's poster boy for insatiable greed and disregard for public safety and health.

Disgraced coal baron Blankenship of Massey Energy symbolized lethal greed

By Brian Bowling

In a four-count indictment, federal prosecutors cite multiple instances when Blankenship, 64, scolded mine management for slowing production to address safety issues or violations cited by inspectors from the Mine Safety and Health Administration.

Blankenship's longtime critics recognize the pattern.

“If he felt he could make more money by breaching a contract or (violating safety and environmental standards), it was automatic. He did it,” Pittsburgh attorney David Fawcett said. He represented Harman Mining Co. and Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel Corp. in several lawsuits challenging Blankenship's business dealings.

The indictment stemming from the 2010 Upper Big Branch explosion accuses Blankenship of conspiring to violate MSHA regulations, impeding safety inspectors, lying to the Securities and Exchange Commission and securities fraud.

“Don was empowered by the war with the union,” Stanley said. “He saw that literally as a life-and-death struggle for himself and those companies.”

BAD NEIGHBOR

Atop a mountain in Sprigg, W.Va., is the mansion in which Blankenship lived during much of his time as head of Massey.

He had employees install a water line to the mansion, Stanley said, while Massey's Rawl subsidiary fought claims by more than 700 neighbors that it polluted their drinking wells by pumping at least 1.4 billion gallons of coal slurry underground.

Chuck Nelson, a former union miner, worked for Massey for six years. He lost his job after helping to organize a protest by fellow residents of Sylvester, W.Va., when a Massey subsidiary blanketed the town with coal dust.

Wind blew the dust from a coal stockpile and conveyor belt on top of a ridge overlooking the town.

“I would come in from working the evening shift, and there would be a half-inch of dust on everything in my house,” Nelson said.

Nelson became one of the few public voices, before the Upper Big Branch explosion, to talk about Blankenship's system of ignoring safety regulations in mines.

It took a lethal explosion at the Upper Big Branch coal mine that killed 29 workers to finally expose Don Blankenship's ruthless behavior, breaking any rules or laws he found inconvenient to increase profits.  

Insatiable greed and disregard for public safety and health have become two recurring themes running through the whole Dirty Energy industry, whether in the Coal Mines of West Virginia or the Tar Sands of Alberta.