[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5100]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          1-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF UPPER BIG BRANCH MINE DISASTER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Woolsey) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, it was exactly 1 year ago today that an 
explosion ripped through Upper Big Branch Mine in Montcoal, West 
Virginia, killing 29 workers. It was the deadliest mine accident in 40 
years. But perhaps ``accident'' is the wrong word to characterize what 
happened in Montcoal, West Virginia, last year April 5. This wasn't a 
hurricane, it wasn't a tsunami or some other act of nature.
  Although the Mine Safety and Health Agency, MSHA, has yet to complete 
their investigation, it is absolutely clear from the preliminary 
reports that this tragedy was avoidable but for negligence and 
carelessness on the part of Massey Energy.
  When Chairman Miller and I traveled to West Virginia with Congressman 
Rahall, miners told us that Massey routinely cut corners on safety. And 
yet the miners were afraid--they told us this too--to come forward for 
fear of losing their jobs. That's why we need stronger Federal 
whistleblower protections, Mr. Speaker. MSHA inspectors can't be 
everywhere all the time. So we need to rely on the people who know 
best. We need to rely on the workers, those that can report safety 
violations, because they are living with them. We must ensure that 
these workers have job protection when they come forward.
  The questions we need to be asking ourselves are what can we be doing 
to make sure this does not happen again to them? What can we do to 
ensure that our Nation's coal miners, some of the hardest working and 
courageous people you will ever meet, aren't descending into a 
potential death trap every time they clock in?
  But the silence from the United States Congress has been positively 
deafening. It is incomprehensible to me that we still haven't passed 
the Robert C. Byrd Miner Safety and Health Act. How many miners have to 
die before we take action?

                              {time}  1040

  Worker safety, not just in mines, but in workplaces above ground and 
across the Nation, is under siege thanks to irresponsible cuts in the 
Republican continuing resolution. Fully half of OSHA's staff would be 
furloughed if H.R. 1 becomes law.
  A weak economy like this one that we are living in right now also 
further undermines worker safety, because as workers who want to report 
violations know, there are dozens who would take their jobs in spite of 
unsafe conditions just to have work.
  Mr. Speaker, last Congress I was chair and now this Congress I am the 
ranking minority member of the Workforce Protection Subcommittee, and 
in that role I am absolutely committed, along with Congressman George 
Miller and Nicky Rahall, to bringing OSHA and MSHA into the 21st 
century, strengthening regulations to protect people from injury, 
sickness, and possible death on the job.
  Needless to say, the Upper Big Branch explosion has devastated a 
tight-knit community with so many families still coping with grief. 
Gary Quarles, who testified before the Education and Labor Committee 
last year, said ``The life's been sucked right out of me'' because he 
lost his only child in the explosion. Another man says of the death of 
his twin brother, ``It's like part of me is gone.'' One woman lost her 
fiance, whom she met when they worked side-by-side in the mine. And I 
cannot imagine the ordeal of Timothy Blake, who survived the blast and 
tried in vain to save eight coworkers.
  But on this one 1-year anniversary, Mr. Speaker, let's do more than 
look back. Let's do more than remember and be sad. Let's use this 
tragedy as a call to action. In honor of the 29 fallen miners, let's 
give their coworkers the safety and protection they deserve.

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