Public Employee Press

Chile mine disaster
Private profits, public rescue

The drama of the 33 Chilean miners rescued Oct. 13 after 10 weeks trapped underground highlighted the need for government safety regulations and tough enforcement.

Two weeks after the rescue, the United States moved for the first time to shut down a coal mine over safety violations. The Massey Energy Co., owner of the Kentucky mine cited for 2,000 violations since 2008, also faces criminal investigations over the April deaths of 29 workers in an explosion at its Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia.

Compania Minera San Esteban - which owns the San Jose copper and gold mine where the Chilean workers were trapped - has a history of safety abuses and deaths at its facilities and was violating an order to install safety equipment there.

"The company only thought about money," said rescued miner Victor Zamora.

"The San Jose mine collapse was a powerful human drama that captured world-wide concern," said Local 154 President Juan Fernandez, a native of Chile, "and an important warning about the danger of letting the free-market run wild."

Astonishingly, the private San Esteban firm claimed it could not afford to continue to pay the trapped miners or fund the rescue operation, which became a global triumph for the public sector.

Chile's President Sabastian Piñera put Codelco, the state-owned mining company, in charge of the job. Staff of NASA, the U.S. government space agency, consulted on safety issues and designed the rescue capsule that hoisted the miners 2,300 feet to the surface.

— Gregory N. Heires