.
July 25th, 2008
01:13 PM ET

Blamed for their death

Watch Gary Tuchman go deep inside Utah's Crandall Canyon Mine, last year, where the six workers were trapped, and his interview with owner, Bob Murray.
Watch Gary Tuchman go deep inside Utah's Crandall Canyon Mine, last year, where the six workers were trapped, and his interview with owner, Bob Murray.

Gary Tuchman
AC360° Correspondent

A few days after six of his coal miners were trapped in the Crandall Canyon mine, the owner of the Utah mine Bob Murray, allowed several journalists, including me, to travel deep into the mine to watch the feverish attempts to rescue the men. It is believed to be the first time journalists were ever allowed in a coal mine during such a rescue attempt.

While we were down there, we heard a deafening noise and the mine started to shake. Everyone I looked at, journalists and rescuers, seemed to freeze for a few seconds. I thought the mine was about to collapse.

The only person who looked relatively calm to me was Bob Murray. The first thing Murray said to me was “it was another earthquake.” If anything, Murray was consistent.

After the horrifying accident happened, Murray expressed confidence his men would be found and then exclaimed matter of factly that the collapse occurred because of an earthquake. There was skepticism about his claim but he stuck with it.

Ten days after the collapse, and just a few days after I was in it, the mine collapsed again. Three of the rescuers were killed. One of those rescuers was a man I met when I was in the mine. The search for the other six men was suspended. And we never heard Bob Murray utter his comments again about an earthquake causing the collapse.

And now, it’s official. The U.S. government has announced that it has fined Bob Murray’s company, Genwal Resources, 1.34 million dollars “for violations that directly contributed to the deaths of six miners last year.”

In addition, his company was fined 300 thousand dollars for other violations, and a mining consultant that worked on Crandall Canyon was fined 220 thousand dollars. It is the highest penalty ever for coal safety violations. Bob Murray had claimed an earthquake caused the collapse.

But the government says the collapse caused an earthquake. The government’s top mine safety official says the mine’s “pillars failed under excessive load and ejected coal very violently.”

Bob Murray has turned down CNN’s recent interview attempts. So I don’t know if he still believes an earthquake caused the collapse. Or, for that matter if he was making that claim because he truly did believe it, was trying to limit his liability, or both. But the government has thrown the book at him. To lose nine men and that much money must be a wrenching cross to bear.


Filed under: Crime & Punishment • Gary Tuchman • T1
soundoff (8 Responses)
  1. Phebe

    Do you know if the families who lost their loved ones are suing or plan to sue Mr. Murray and his company? Or do coal miners sign some sort of waiver because they work in such dangerous conditions?
    I remember your coverage of this and what struck me at the time was Mr. Murray's frenetic approach to publicizing his side of the story and justifying his belief that every safety precaution had been taken. If I may switch up an old saying.......'He doth defend too much',

    July 26, 2008 at 1:35 pm |
  2. Annie Kate

    I hope that the families of those miners who died in the mine collapse receive some compensation as well. They are the ones who suffered the loss of their loved one and probably their main wage-earner. I know the fines imposed are government fines and not likely to go to the families but it would be nice if just once the government would take some of that money and spread it among the dead miners' families.

    i'm glad the company got fined – I wanted to believe Mr. Murray during the time CNN covered the accident but having lived in coal mining districts growing up I knew that it was probably not mother nature causing the mine collapse and that it was the mining practices of the company that led to the collapse.

    Annie Kate
    Birmingham AL

    July 25, 2008 at 9:15 pm |
  3. EJ (USA)

    While we were down there, we heard a deafening noise and the mine started to shake. Everyone I looked at, journalists and rescuers, seemed to freeze for a few seconds. I thought the mine was about to collapse.

    I just hope you love what you're doing and the dangers you and other reporters put yourself in is worth it. If you were my brother or my husband or a close friend – I would try (probably unsuccessfully) to convince you not to go into situations that have a 50/50 chance of ending your life.. But you're a reporter and that's what you do – so have fun with it.

    July 25, 2008 at 6:20 pm |
  4. Heather

    I really wanted to believe everything he said. He appeared to go out of his way to make sure everyone knew everything. But in the end I don't think he wanted to accept the fact that he was in fact totally and completely responsible for the explosion and the deaths of the men that followed. He just didnt want to believe it. I think the money was just to good to resist. Im sure he paid the company that told him what he was doing was safe a great deal of money. Its sad in the end, all those men are dead when maybe if they had mined the proper way they might be alive. I think the fines are the least of his problems. I see many lawsuits in his future.

    July 25, 2008 at 5:34 pm |
  5. Amanda

    During interviews Bob always seemed like he was a little kid trying to cover up something he had done to avoid punishment. He also seemed to cling desperately to the fact that the miners were still alive and would be rescued – but not for the reasons their families were – he seemed to do it more to absolve his own guilt.

    My hearts go out to these families – they will never get to gain closure on the situation that is normally provided by a traditional funeral, they will always wonder about what their loved ones faced during this tragedy, and what the final moments of their lives were like.

    It seems to me that all this is about greed – greed to get the most money out of this mine as possible. I think it's good that these fines were imposed – but the larger question is – where will this money go? It seems to me that each of the miners' families should receive whatever compensation they are entitled to from this company before anyone else.

    July 25, 2008 at 2:14 pm |
  6. marcy

    Hey Gary – Dry yet? – will the families get any of that money?!

    July 25, 2008 at 2:10 pm |
  7. Stacy

    Thanks for the update, Gary. It's good to hear Genwal Resources is being fined. Hopefully the government will do more to enforce mine safety from now on.

    July 25, 2008 at 2:02 pm |
  8. Cindy

    Gary,
    I think we all remember this horrible situation way too well. And I remember you being in the cave when the supposed earthquake occurred. Thankfully nothing happened then!

    I always thought that Bob was just saying that the earthquake caused the collapse just to get out of trouble in the future. I guess we all see the truth now. The hammer was definitely lowered on him and all that were associated with their mining! It won't of course bring back the men who lost their lives but it can give the families ammo to take Bob to court for wrongful deaths of their loved ones.

    Cindy...Ga.

    July 25, 2008 at 1:22 pm |