Tuesday, January 03, 2006

Desperate crawl to save trapped miners

Is there any chance these guys are still alive? I guess they need to go through the motions of a rescue, and I'd certainly want them to if I was down there, but it's been like a day and a half, I don't see much chance these guys are still alive even if they survived the initial explosion. In 2006, shouldn't there be better ways to do mining than sending people down there? It sure seems like there should.

Anyway, on the bright side for West Virginia, they did (barely) hang on to win the Sugar Bowl.

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4 comments:

michelline said...

I think you have to know for sure. If they can send these guys down there in the first place, I think they have an obligation to make every effort to rescue them.

I thought they had automated coal-mining machines. I remember reading something about these giant machines that would plow through the earth and go right under people's houses, making their foundations crack when the land settled. But the landowners couldn't do shit about it because the law gave the underground mineral rights to someone else. So the mining companies had no legal liability and didn't have to repair people's houses.

John Howard said...

Yeah, absolutely they need to try, I just don't see much hope.

I'm sure they have machines, but I imagine real people are just cheaper.

That sucks about the liability, that's just bullshit. Like those dump trucks that say they're not responsible for broken windshields. Bullshit. If you don't want to be respnsible for them, then make sure your shit stays in your truck.

Melissa McEwan said...

If you want to get even more depressed, read this.

michelline said...

If you want to get even more depressed, read this.

That's a good post. Just more evidence for the incompetence of this administration. Like he says in the piece, you can't blame Bush directly for a mine accident. But you can use it to illustrate the failings of cronyism and the dangers of letting the fox guard the henhouse.