The Kentucky Office of Mine Safety and Licensing said 33-year-old Farley Sargent was laying track at the No. 23 mine of James River’s McCoy Elkhorn complex in Pike County.
The accident marks the tenth coal mining-related death of the year in the US and the third in Kentucky according to the Mine Safety and Health Administration.
McCoy Elkhorn’s KC No. 1 mine recorded a death last April when a 61-year-old demolition contractor was killed by a falling frame support beam when dismantling a conveyor stacker.
Kentucky’s WFPL News cited federal records that noted McCoy Elkhorn’s No. 23 mine had been inspected by regulators several times already this month and had racked up 16 violations since June 1.
Five of the violations were categorized as “significant and substantial”
The mine has been closed pending an ongoing investigation by the state Department of Natural Resources, MSHA and the US Department of Labor.
The McCoy Elkhorn complex sprawls across Kentucky’s Pike and Floyd counties with room-and-pillar underground mines and highwall mining employed on surface operations.
James River Coal produced 10.3 million tons of coal in 2011 through its eight operating subsidiaries located in Kentucky, West Virginia and southern Indiana.
