UPDATED AT 12:30 A.M. SATURDAY: No word yet folks … we’ll update as soon as we know anything.

Here’s more from the scene down at Marsh Fork Elementary School, where media from around the world are camped out waiting to learn the fate of the four Massey Energy miners still unaccounted for after a massive explosion Monday afternoon. This is from Gazette staffer Andrew Clevenger, who is on the scene:

“We’re happy with the concentrations of gas–it’s not explosive, it’s not on fire, and there’s no smoke,” said Stricklin.

Four eight-man teams are at a staging area within the mine, he said. Two teams will advance to check on the final refuge chamber, the only hope for survival for the four miners who are still unaccounted for.

Visibility inside the mine is limited to about 100 feet, because after Monday’s massive explosion, there is probably dust in the air and the walls are charred black, making it harder to see. The refuge chamber is located in a cross cut, meaning that rescue teams would need to be almost on top of it before they can tell whether it has been deployed, an obvious indication that there are miners inside.

If there is no one inside the chamber, the mission immediately shifts to recovering the bodies of dead miners and taking them out of the mine.

“[With t]he concentrations of gas that we’ve seen throughout the entire mine… there’s no way that life could be sustained in that kind of atmosphere, even for a short period of time,” he said.

Even though rescue teams have made four forays into the mine and are becoming more and more familiar with the terrain, debris from the explosion, coupled with the fact that they have to be careful not to let their breathing masks slip off of their faces, makes for slow going.

“There’s destruction just about everywhere. It was a violent explosion” that caused “massive damage,” Stricklin said.

No bodies have been brought out of the mine since Monday, and no additional identifications have been made during the aborted rescue attempts, he said.

Manchin said the families were anxious to learn the fate of their loved ones.

“Tonight, I told them our journey is about to end,” he said. But for many, the healing process is just beginning, he said.
“They have formed a bond that will last them the rest of their lives.”

“They just want to take their fathers and sons, their uncles, they want to take them home. They want to take them home,” he said.

Manchin took a few moments to asks the national and international media to look beyond their preconceptions of West Virginians.

If you walk up any creek or hollow and knock on any door, you’ll probably be greeted with a smile, he said. If you’re hungry, they’ll feed you. If you’re lost, they’ll show you the way personally, he said.

“If you’re looking for patriotic people, there are no more patriotic people than right here,” he said, noting that many are military veterans. West Virginians are proud that this country was built on the energy produced by the coal mined from Appalachian hills, he said.

The governor said that the state investigation into the explosion would begin “immediately.”

“Our MSHA people will start immediately on the investigation, because nothing can change until that’s done,” he said.

Individual funerals for miners began Friday, with more to come in the days ahead. A joint memorial for all the deceased is in the planning stages, and President Obama and Vice President Biden have expressed interest in attending if their schedules allow it, Manchin said.

He asked that people observe a moment of silence at 3:30 p.m. on Monday, which would mark one week since the explosion ripped through the mine.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 9, 2010 at 10:21 pm and is filed under Mine Safety, Upper Big Branch Disaster. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.