Rescue officials and West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin just announced a huge setback in their efforts to find the four miners still missing inside the Massey Energy Upper Big Branch Mine in Raleigh County, W.Va.
Repeated readings for carbon monoxide, methane and other gases indicated a potentially explosive mixture, prompting a decision to pull four rescue teams from the mine just five hours after they went in early this morning.
“We’ve had a setback,” said Kevin Stricklin, coal administrator for the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration.
My coworker Andrew Clevenger, who is at the briefing going on right now, tells me that as soon as rescue teams are out of the mine, crews will resume drilling boreholes to try to speed up the ventilation of toxic gases from the mine.
“There is so much gas built up in the area that it’s taking us a while to ventilate,” Stricklin said.
Stay tuned … and pray for the miners.
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