Mine Safety

Attached below is an advance copy of the Security and Exchange Commission’s Final Rule on corporate disclosure requierments for mine safety.  The disclosure requirements apply only to US mines.

As the SEC summarized,

We are adopting amendments to our rules to implement Section 1503 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Section 1503(a) of the Act requires issuers that are operators, or that have a subsidiary that is an operator, of a coal or other mine to disclose in their periodic reports filed with the Commission information regarding specified health and safety violations, orders and citations, related assessments and legal actions, and mining-related fatalities.

By VICKI SMITH, Associated Press

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) — A lawyer suing the former Massey Energy Co. says investors might have made better decisions about putting money into the coal company had it been required to report safety violations to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission before last year’s Upper Big Branch mine disaster that killed 29 miners.

Instead, New York attorney Joel Bernstein says, shareholders relied on Massey’s false claims that it had launched initiatives to make safety a priority after earlier accidents.

“They told the public, they told the employees and they told the investors they were doing it,” he says, “and they didn’t.”

U.S. Department of Labor

Mine Safety and Health Administration 1100 Wilson Boulevard Arlington, Virginia 22209-3939

PROCEDURE INSTRUCTION LETTER NO. I11-V-10

FROM:           KEVIN G. STRICKLIN
                     Administrator for
                     Coal Mine Safety and Health

SUBJECT:     Mine Rescue Inspections Pertaining to Mine Rescue Teams and
                    Mine Rescue Stations

Scope
This Procedure Instruction Letter (PIL) applies to Coal Mine Safety and Health (CMS&H) enforcement personnel.

From: MSHA

US Labor Department’s MSHA cites corporate culture as root cause of Upper Big Branch Mine disaster
Massey issued 369 citations and orders with $10.8 million in civil penalties

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration today announced that it has imposed a fine of $10,825,368, the largest in agency history, following its investigation into the April 2010 explosion at the Upper Big Branch-South Mine, which was operated by Performance Coal Co., a subsidiary of Massey Energy Co. The investigation followed an explosion that killed 29 miners and injured two – the worst U.S. coal mining disaster in 40 years. A report concludes that Massey’s corporate culture was the root cause of the tragedy. MSHA has issued Massey and PCC 369 citations and orders, including for an unprecedented 21 flagrant violations, which carry the most serious civil penalties available under the law.