A US Mine Safety and Health Administration spokesperson said that Kevin Campbell, 49, was working for Pennsylvanian contractor 18 Karat at Consol Energy’s McElroy operation in Marshall County, West Virginia, February 3 when he was pinned between a bulldozer and water truck.

According to a preliminary report, which classifies the death as Machinery, Campbell was attaching a tow chain to the truck when the dozer rolled backwards and pinned him.

Witnesses to the incident said Campbell was alive when freed. He later died before reaching a hospital.

“Reportedly, the blade of the dozer was not lowered onto the pavement prior to the victim exiting the dozer, and it appears the dozer drifted backwards, and crushed the victim between the frame of the dozer and the frame of the water truck,” the agency said last week.

The incident occurred at a gas well-plugging operation on the minesite. The drill rig was owned by CSI Contracting, the bulldozer by 18 Karat and the water truck by Burns Drilling and Excavating.

The fatality is the second in the US coal industry so far in 2011; the first occurred late in January. Both deaths were in West Virginia.