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January 19, 2006, Melville, Logan County West Virginia
a conveyor belt inside the Aracoma Alma Mine No. 1 at Melville caught fire. The conveyor belt ignited pouring smoke through the gaps in
the cinderblock stoppings and into the fresh air passageway that the miners were supposed to use for their escape,
obscuring their vision and ultimately leading to the death of two of them.
If the cinderblock
sections had been in place, they would have prevented any exchange of air between the conveyor belt and the fresh air intake,
the primary source of air for workers inside the mine. Instead, investigators believe, smoke flooded into the air intake,
which also serves as an escape route, disorienting two of the miners, who became lost and died in the fire. Two West Virginia
coal miners lost their lives in this, "preventable" mine fire.
They were:
Ellery Hatfield
and Don Bragg
