[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 50 (Monday, April 12, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2184-S2185]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            RECENT TRAGEDIES

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I wish to extend my personal condolences to 
those who suffered the two tragedies while we were back home--one here 
in America and one halfway around the world.
  The mining tragedy in West Virginia hit home for me. It brought back 
a lot of memories. When I was less than 1 week old, my dad was working 
in a mine in a place called Chloride, AZ, which was just over the 
Colorado River from Searchlight. He and another man were sinking a 
shaft, and in those days you didn't have all the protections you have 
today. They had drilled some holes--seven to be exact--and always, when 
the holes are lit, both miners

[[Page S2185]]

don't stay there. They leave and one remains to light the hole. So Carl 
Myers, who was working with my dad, went to the next level, as a matter 
of fact, and waited until the holes were lit, and then my dad would 
come up and meet him and the holes would go off.
  What happened was that one of the pieces of fuse was defective, and 
it set off one of the holes prematurely. It blew my dad's light out and 
blew one of the soles off his shoe. He was hurt and in a state of 
shock. What the miners did in those days, in a shaft, is they would 
have a sinking ladder about 10 feet long and they would take it up 
before the holes went off and then they would climb out on that ladder. 
My dad, even though he was hurt, knew he had to get out of that mine 
because he knew there were six other holes burning. They were covered 
with muck. He had to get out of there, so he put the ladder down and 
tried to climb out, but it kept falling over. His mind wasn't working 
well and he couldn't understand why that was, but the blast had blown 
one of the legs off the ladder, so it kept tipping over.
  The man that was on the next level, knowing how many holes had been 
drilled and knowing only one had gone off and that there were six more 
to go, in spite of that, came down and helped carry my dad, who was 
much bigger than he was, out of that mine. He got a medal for heroism, 
and the incident was written up by the great journalist Lowell Thomas.
  I can remember as a boy my mother still picking rocks out of my dad's 
back as a result of that blast. In a book I wrote about Searchlight, I 
talk about a number of the deaths in the mines at Searchlight. My dad 
worked quite a bit at Blossom, and the dad of one of my friends I grew 
up with was killed in that mine. My dad carried him out of that hole. 
So I have some knowledge about how people feel when these mining 
accidents occur.
  As I said, this tragedy brought back a lot of memories, and I extend 
my condolences to all the people of West Virginia, through Governor 
Manchin, Senator Byrd, and Senator Rockefeller. I sympathize with the 
people of West Virginia for their loss.
  I also extend my condolences to the people of Poland. That plane 
carried 96 souls--parents, husbands, wives, and friends. It carried 
that nation's President, its First Lady, its Deputy Foreign Minister, 
lawmakers, their military chief of staff, and so many other military 
and civilian leaders. The tragic loss is unthinkable, and America 
grieves alongside our friends in Poland, especially when you understand 
where they were going and why they were going there--20,000 Poles had 
been killed by the Russians even before war on Germany was declared by 
us.

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