Rescuers race to find trapped Utah miners

HUNTINGTON, Utah — Hundreds of rescuers struggled with falling rock and debris Monday in a desperate race to reach six coal miners trapped 1,500 feet below ground by a cave-in so powerful authorities initially thought it was an earthquake.

As the rescue stretched into the night, workers were unable to make significant progress and the initial effort was declared a failure.

"I'm very disappointed. That's one step backward," said Robert Murray, chairman of Murray Energy, of Cleveland, a part owner of the Crandall Canyon mine.

More than 16 hours after the collapse, searchers had not been able to contact the miners and could not say whether they were dead or alive.

Rescuers planned to spend the night bulldozing a road outside the mine to make way for a drilling rig that could punch holes large enough to improve ventilation and determine whether the men were alive, Murray said. They also planned to continue drilling from inside and outside the mine, he said.

The mining crew was believed to be about four miles from the mine's entrance. If the miners survived, Murray said they would likely have plenty of oxygen because air naturally leaks into the mine. The mine also is stocked with drinking water.

Relatives of the miners waited for news at a nearby senior center. Many of the family members don't speak English, so Huntington Mayor Hilary Gordon hugged them, put her hands over her heart and then clasped them together to let them know she was praying for them, she said.

"Past experience tells us these things don't go very well," said Gordon, whose husband is a former miner.

Outside the senior center, Ariana Sanchez, 16, said her father, Manuel Sanchez, 42, was among the trapped miners.

The mine is built into a mountain in the rugged Manti-La Sal National Forest, 140 miles south of Salt Lake City, in a sparsely populated area.

University of Utah seismograph stations recorded seismic waves of 3.9 magnitude early Monday in the area of the mine, causing speculation that a minor earthquake had caused the cave-in. Scientists later realized the collapse at the mine had caused the disturbance, which was reported to authorities around 4 a.m. But by late afternoon, they said a natural earthquake could not be ruled out and more information was needed to conclusively determine what happened.

Government mine inspectors have issued 325 citations against the mine since January 2004, according to a quick analysis of federal Mine Safety and Health Administration (MHSA) online records. Of those, 116 were what the government considered "significant and substantial," meaning they are likely to cause injury.

That many violations is not unusual, said J. Davitt McAteer, former head of the MHSA and now vice president of Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia.

"It's not perfect, but it's certainly not bad," McAteer said. "It would be in the medium range."

In 2007, inspectors have issued 32 citations against the mine, 14 of them considered significant.

Last month, inspectors cited the mine for violating a rule requiring that at least two separate passageways be designated for escape in an emergency. It was the third time in less than two years that the mine had been cited for the same problem, according to MSHA records.

Asked about safety, Murray said: "I believe we run a very safe coal mine. We've had an excellent record."