Day five of the WV Coal Project Tour

Today we start at the Logan Walmart Plaza.  This plaza would not be possible if not for coal mining.  One, it provided the large flat surface for the plaza and coal mining provides the economic foundation for the growth of these southern WV coal counties.

We then travel to the CoalMac Surface Mine in Logan County.  This tour of a surface mine dispells many preconseved ideas that I had about surface mining and mountain top removal.  What I saw was an operation that goes to great legnths to do a high quality job in all aspects of surface mining.  These professionals use the best technology and innovations to reclaim mined lands.  Areas observed  5 to 6 years after being reclaimed demonstrated wildlife, biodiversity, and native species.  Some of these reclaimed lands were being used for a horse farm and a cow calf beef producing operation.  After meeting and talking to the people at CoalMac and seeing what they do it made me proud of WV coal mining.

We finished the day at the Mountain Laurel Processing Plant at Sharples WV.  This plant processes coal fo a deep mine and right now due to market conditions is producing on met. coal used to make steel.  This facility cleans and grades coal to meet the specifications of individual customers.  This plant is again cutting edge technology the best in the world right here in WV. 

Day six- WV Coal Project Tour

We finish our tour in Wayne County at the Rockspring Mine at East Lynn, which is part of Alpha Energy. Today we go underground to see mining done as it is today with a continous miner, a machine that mines and loads coal in one process. The other process involved in this type of mining beside hauling it out of the mine by conveyor is roofbolting. This is the modern way to secure the roof so that it dosen't cave in and trap or kill the miners. A machine drills holes into the roof in which a long bolt of various legnths is inserted into the hole with a resin that hardens and when the bolt is tightened it secures a metal plate that holds the roof. Once the new 40 ft. section is mined a machine comes in and cleans up the area pushing the remaining coal and rock against the face. Rock dust is then applied to the walls to retard fire. Mines are not black but white because of this.

We begin our tour with safty training, and are then outfited with our equipment. We begin our trip into the mine to the working face on a mantrip that runs on rails. we go about 4 miles to the nearest working face. On the way we learn why the mantrip has a thick metal roof because a rock falls on our car making all of us including Clark, our guide, jump. At the end of the rails we get on another transporter with wheels that takes us the rest of the way to the working face. strung through the mine is a giant electric cable that supplies the power for all the equipment. This goes into a giant box which steps the power down to what is necessary for the operation of various equipment from the 110 volts needed for the microwave at the miners lunch table to the higher voltages used by the continous miner and other machines.

The mine has a excellent safty record even though the top or roof is not the most stable. Dust and gasses are a constant danger in the mine so ventalation is of upmost importants. Doors, plastic curtains and plastic sheeting are used to direct both clean and dirty air. One system pumps clean air in and another pumps the bad stuff out. Both systems are powered by giant fans.

We first see the continous miner in operation. It is controlled by one man who stands back behind with a controller connected to the mine machine by a cable. On the front of the machine, is a large drum with teeth that rotates and cuts the coal from the face. Arms behind the drum rake the coal and rock into a hopper. It is then loaded into a carrier which transports it to the conveyor. The conveyor transports it to the processing plant on the other end of the mine which is 15 miles away. There the coal is seperated from the rock and cleaned and loaded on to railroad cars for shipment. With this method, about 15 tons of coal and rock were mined in about one minute. Of the rock and coal mined at this site only about 40 % is coal.

We then go to a room that had already been mined to see the roof bolter in action. This machine is run by a two person crew. We see an area with a strap between to roofbolts. The strap is there to keep a kettle bottom from falling out. The kettle bottom is a petrified tree trunk preserved vertically in the roof and is prone to fall out. Many miners have been hurt or killed by these. We go to another room that has already been bolted to see the cleanup person in action. Later during third shift crews come in and spray the walls with rockdust(lime) to retard fire.

What I observed, in this mine and on the whole tour was the quality of the professionals involved in this business. Although miners can start after highschool, they need to develope a specific skill set to be a miner. The competitive nature of the energy business forces mines to use technology to become efficient and cost effective producers. Part of being cost effective is being safe. These miners have high paying jobs that benefit their communities and the state.

Day four - WV Coal Project tour

Today starts out with a visit to the Beckley Exibition Coal mine.  This mine operated from 1890 to 1910.  The market for the coal dug here was local it was distributed by horse and buggy to people for home heating, probably blacksmithing, and other local uses.  This was a high quality coal seam called the sewell seam.  The seam was 30 to 40 inches thick which meant that the miners worked all day with a pick and shovel on tjeir knees or sides.  Six to Twenty miners worked the mine for the 20 years it was mined going back into the seam 5 to 7 miles.  The coal was hand loaded into a car that ran on wooden rails.  For his efforts he earned 20 cents a ton or a few dollars a day. 

Our next stop in Beckley was at TEREX SHM a manufacturing company that is the world leader in the production of highwall mining systems.  These giant machines are the cutting edge technology in highwall surface mining.  These machines are sent from Beckley to places around the world.  It is great to see world leading manufacturing and technology coming from Beckley WV.

Our next stop was Welch in McDowell County.  The purpose of the stop is go visit the site of the killing of Sid Hatfield and Ed Chambers.  This event is tied to coal because Sid was the sheriff of Matewan one of the few independent towns in southern WV that was not controlled by the coal companies.  Sid had been a miner himself and refused to be bought out by the coal operators. 

The United Mine Workers, the union of the miners were desperate to unionize the southern WV Coal Fields.  The operators, due to the cost of labor effecting their ability to make money,  were just as determined to keep the union out and not give the miners the pay increase the union would demand is they organized.  This set the stage fot the events that led to the shootings of Hatfield and Chambers at Welch.

Day two WV Coal Project Tour

We began day two leaving Canaan Valley State Park.  We traveled a short distance into the Canaan backcountry to a site that had been stripped bare of vegetation and had also  been mined.  The site has recovered naturally over the past 100 years.  The water quality is acceptable  compared to many other sites near by.  The vast forest of the past are now replaced by spangium moss, blueberries, cherry, maple and other trees and bushes.  We then went down the Blackwater Canyon to the Coketon Douglas Mining Reclaimation site.  This site was the largest mining and coking site in the United States.  Because of the iron sulfide in the mining refuse of the area and a certain bacterium that reacts with it the rocks in the stream, Yellow Creek, are bright orange.  The miners called this yellowboy.   This causes the stream to be very acidic and devoid of life.  After lunch at Blackwater Falls we traveled down highway 219 to Greenbrier County having a fine dinner at Lewisburg.

day one Our WV Coal Tour

We left Huntington at 1:00pm headed for Thomas WV in Tucker County inpp theep northern part of the state just below the v formed on the map by the connection of the eastern panhandle.  Before reaching Thomas we passed through Parsons home of the windmills located here because of the Allegheny Front which is the eastern conintental divide.  This high mountain escarpment allows the windmills to face the prevailing winds unobstructed allowing for maxium power generation.
    Of course, most electric produced in WV comes from coal burning power plants, but coal was first used to power the industrial revolutoion in the US.  Our next stop Thomas in Tucker County was founded by Henry Gassaway Davis taking advantage of the timber and coal  reserves of the area, Davis built R R's to haul these resources to the markets of the Atlantic coast.  He had tremendous influnce on the political economic and cultural development of WV.  But he was also culpable in the environmental distruction caused by these practices across the state.

Keystone WV-McDowell Co. Coal Camp

Keystone WV

Keystone was originally known as Cassville. It was founded and named for the Keystone Coke and Coal Company in 1892. It is located in the very southern border county of McDowell in the Northeastern part. Today Keystone is 73% African American. During the time of the beginning of major coal production the native labor force was inadequate to meet the needs of the coal company. African Americans were recruited from North and South Carolina and European Immigrants were also recruited. Specifically, Magyars were brought to this part of the Pocahontas Coal Field. Slovaks, Poles and Italians were also inhabitants. One former Keystone resident remembered Italian families in Keystone pooling money to buy a boxcar of grapes to make wine. In 1936 Koppers Coal Co. bought out Keystone. In 1967 Eastern Associated Coal and Pocahontas Empire Coal Co. took control of the mines. Today Keystone is Russian owned belonging to the Mechel Bluestone Coal Company. The Keystone #1 Mine was the oldest mine in the Pocahontas field. It produced for 94 years before being exhausted in 1986.

July 13, 2010
Day 3- We are headed today to Dolly Sods. It is a unique botanical area on a high plateau in Randolph County. One hundred years ago it was covered in virgin timber. After being clear cut in the early 20th century it was burned, then burned again when used for bombing practice during WWII. Today the area is wilderness once again and is a great place to study plant secession.
We first walked out Northland Loop seeing spruce, hemlock, blueberry (of which we picked and ate some) very delicious. We saw lichens, the carnivorous plant sundew which captures ants and other insects with a sticky substance that it produces, and a host of other plants and insects.
We continued out the plateau to Bear Rocks. It is a giant cliff like rock formation with a great vista of the valley below. We climbed on the rocks and took pictures of the sights to see. Because of the exposure to the prevailing winds, the trees on the Sods are flag trees, the limbs protrude to the leeward side.
Seneca rocks, our next stop, are a much pictured outcrop of stone. This unique formation was caused by the tremendous forces of the Appalachian Revolution. The sediment layers through upheaval and time have been made vertical when the end of the mountain was exposed by erosion the beautiful and breathtaking cliffs were formed.

Also at Seneca Rocks is the refurbished scite of Jacob Scites homestead. He was of of the first settlers to the area. It started out as a one room cabin and way made two stories by his son.

Today we also visited Smokehole Caverns, so named because settlers could see smoke coming from the enterance when Indians used it to smoke their meat from hunting. It was 54 degrees in the cavern and we saw many intersting rock formations.

We finished the day at Spruse Knob, the highest point in the state. It had been raining and was very foggy. Like Dolly Sods it had many interesting examples of unique flora. By this time i think the group was ready to return to Thomas for a great dinner.