Miners' relatives head for hearing

PRICE — Family members of the nine miners killed in the Crandall Canyon Mine in August are traveling today to Washington, D.C., where five of them will testify before a House committee Wednesday.

The overwhelming objective among the group is to promote their belief that neither the mine's owner, Murray Energy, nor the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration adequately monitored threats to the safety of the miners underground. They want to see changes.

"It will be a bittersweet moment," Kristin Kimber said. "To ensure this won't ever happen again is the purpose of us going."

She is convinced that mine owners knew they were using dangerous techniques to extract coal from the mine and that MSHA "rubber-stamped" dangerous mining plans.

Brandon Kimber, her ex-husband and the father of their three children, worked underground in the Crandall Canyon Mine and was among the nine rescue workers buried in coal Aug. 16 while they searched for the six men trapped in an Aug. 6 seismic event.

Official records show mine-induced seismic activity at the mine had been significant since March.

One of the six rescuers who survived that incident told Kristin Kimber that Brandon had saved his life by diving on top of him when a wall of coal exploded and buried the men.

"He did that instinctively. There wasn't time to think; there was just time to do," Kristin Kimber said. "He said, 'I would want them to come in after me, and I have to go in after them.' Brandon was just that kind of guy to worry."

But he didn't tell Kristin about everything that went wrong in the mine because he didn't want her to worry. Now that nine men are dead, the stories about safety concerns in the mine keep piling up.

Price attorney Sonny Olsen said he has talked to a dozen miners who worked in the Crandall Canyon mine and have related stories about safety concerns.

Some of the best witnesses are afraid to talk, Olsen said, though he hopes their feelings will change.

Olsen said he is also disturbed by MSHA's investigation team, which has visited the mine and taken pictures inside but plans to conduct the rest of its investigation into the deadly accident through interviews, not mine visits.

"I'm not very confident we're going to get to the bottom of what really happened," Olsen said.