Report: Safety failure led to fatal injury at surface coal mine in Eastern Kentucky
An accident that killed a worker at a surface coal mine in Eastern Kentucky happened because he hadn’t been instructed to turn off a piece of equipment before working on it, causing a fatal injury when he was knocked into a metal railing, federal regulators concluded.
The employee, 48-year-old Douglas Slusher of Middlesboro, also hadn’t received a refresher training as required, according to a report from the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA).
Slusher died Oct. 9. The mine agency released its report on the investigation of his death this week.
Slusher was on a crew that was hydroseeding at the mine when the accident happened.
Hydroseeding is part of the process of reclaiming a surface mine. It involves using a high-pressure hose to spray a slurry of seed, fertilizer, mulch and water onto bare dirt to get vegetation to grow, reducing erosion.
The spray mechanism is mounted on the back of a large truck.
Slusher worked for Puckett Creek Hydroseeding. He and the company owner, Tommy Spade, and truck driver James Asher were at the mine when the accident happened, according to the MSHA report.
Spade told Slusher to change the nozzle on the hose so it could spray the slurry farther up the slope.
The motor on the hydroseeder was running full throttle while Slusher changed the nozzle. When he was done, Slusher engaged the clutch on the machine as the nozzle was pointed directly as him.
A burst of slurry hit Slusher, causing him to fall backward and hit his neck on the railing of the machine, according to the report.
The hydroseeder machine is designed to spray the slurry at a rate of 400 gallons a minute, the report said.
Spade, who had watched Slusher change the nozzle, saw him fall and motioned to Asher, the truck driver, that there was a problem.
Asher shut off the truck and climbed up on the back to check on Slusher, but he was unresponsive.
Mine workers trained in emergency first aid performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Slusher but couldn’t revive him. The married father of five was pronounced dead at the mine.
MSHA cited Puckett Creek Hydroseeding, saying that not having Slusher shut off the engine while changing the nozzle was an “unwarrantable failure” to comply with a mandatory safety standard.
Slusher was one of two people killed in coal mining accidents in Kentucky last year.
The other death occurred Oct. 13 when a piece of machinery called a scoop hit Phillip T. Ramsey, 58, at Warrior Coal’s underground Cardinal mine in Hopkins County.
The mine is owned by Alliance Resource Partners LP.
The federal mining agency hasn’t releasing findings on the cause of the accident.
There was a third mining death in the state in 2020 that happened at a sandstone mine in Pike County on Dec. 15.
George W. Fitzpatrick, 58, of Johnson County, suffered a fatal injury while trying to change a tire on a front-end loader, according to MSHA.
There were five mining deaths in Kentucky in 2019, all of them at coal mines.
Of the 29 mining fatalities in the U.S. last year, only five were at coal mines, with the rest at mines that produce a variety of products including limestone, gravel, salt and gold, according to a release from the Department of Labor.
The five deaths at coal mines was a historic low nationwide, the agency said.
There are 1,000 coal mines in the country and 11,500 other operations called metal/nonmetal mines, according to the department.
