Federal regulators have proposed that equipment used to haul coal in underground mines be required to have technology designed to prevent miners from being run over or crushed.
Such a warning system might have prevented the most recent death at an underground coal mine in Kentucky, according
Federal regulators have proposed that equipment used to haul coal in underground mines be required to have technology designed to prevent miners from being run over or crushed.
Such a warning system might have prevented the most recent death at an underground coal mine in Kentucky, according to the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration.
In that case, a miner operating a machine called a ram car ran over Eli Eldridge. The fatality happened Dec. 16 at Highland 9 mine in Union County, which was operated by a subsidiary of Patriot Coal.
Eldridge, a mechanic, had been walking through the mine to check on needed repairs when he was hit.
MSHA concluded that the Highland mine didn't have effective safeguards to keep workers from being hit by moving equipment.
Patriot closed the mine soon after for economic reasons.
The technology covered in the rule MSHA proposed this month is called a proximity-detection system. It uses electronic sensors to detect motion and the distance between a miner and a machine.
The systems activate audible and visual warnings if a machine comes too close to a miner, and they are designed to stop a machine automatically before it hits someone.
Under the proposed rule, companies would have to install the technology on machines such as ram cars and scoops, which are used to move coal from the face — where it's being clawed out by continuous-mining machines — to conveyors that carry 