According to the Associated Press, the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission handed down the preliminary decision on Wednesday. Mine owner PBS Coals and engineering contractor Musser Engineering had challenged the fines that were initially assessed last November by administrative law judge Robert Lesnick.
A US Mine Safety and Health Administration safety panel had recommended a lesser fine of $5000 each to the two companies, but Lesnick rejected that in his assessment. While the federal agency felt PBS and Musser were moderately negligent, the judge called their actions “grossly negligent”
The review commission, meanwhile, urged the judge to consider the size of the companies and the impact those assessed fines would have on their financial futures and ability to remain open.
All nine miners who were trapped for three days from July 24, 2002, worked for Black Wolf Coal, which agreed last year to pay a fine of $4100 related to the incident. There were no deaths as a result of the flooding.
“PBS strongly disagrees with the decision ... and has always considered the safety of its miners to be of the greatest importance," attorney Vincent Barbera told media outlets at the time of Lesnick’s decision last year, noting then that the company would appeal.
In March of this year, eight of the nine trapped workers settled disputes with PBS and Musser that they had filed for negligence due to the use of uncertified and outdated maps.
While monetary sums included in the settlement were not disclosed and will remain confidential, the defendants did not admit to negligence in the inundation, which flooded more than 72 million gallons of water into the Quecreek mine.
The ninth miner involved in the accident did not sue.
According to a March story in local newspaper the Tribune-Democrat, a second group of six miners who escaped the entrapment and made it to the surface without injury also sued the companies, and shared in the settlement.
Last August, Moscow-based Severstal Resources acquired PBS Coals in a deal worth $1.3 billion.
Severstal is a division of OAO Severstal, which received PBS as part of its takeover of parent company Penfold Capital Acquisition Corporation.
PBS, a 4 million tons per annum producer, has six underground and six surface operations.
