Independent Review of MSHA's Actions at Crandall Canyon Mine

for an hour and one-half and then went home without passing the information along. No
detailed information was provided to the persons-in-charge concerning this critical event.
The persons-in-charge at Crandall Canyon stated that they thought someone was conducting
debriefings, but they didn’t know who and they weren’t receiving feedback from debriefings if
they were conducted. MSHA’s persons-in-charge could not confirm that company personnel
were being debriefed, and therefore, did not receive any feedback from company rescue
workers either. It was also common knowledge that approximately 12 company miners asked
to be withdrawn from the face area, and were replaced. It could be assumed that these miners
may have had critical information as to why they asked to be relieved from the face work. The
MSHA persons-in-charge said they did not attempt to interview any of these miners. No other
MSHA person talked to any of these miners to find out what their concerns were or why they
asked to be withdrawn. This was a valuable source of information that was not utilized.
4) Feedback to the command center persons-in-charge from Technical Support ground
control experts who were on site. Two ground control specialists from Technical Support’s
RCD responded to the accident at Crandall Canyon, arriving on August 7 th . They were
immediately dispatched underground to evaluate the area and determine which entry would
be best to clean up. While underground, the plan to clean up the No.1 entry was approved
without their input. The specialists were asked to comment on a plan revision to allow the use
of 6 x 8 wooden posts instead of 8 x 8 posts originally approved but which were unavailable.
The specialists stated that they never saw nor were they consulted regarding any other
support plans or revisions that were submitted to MSHA by the operator. The specialists were
underground nearly every day of the rescue operation, observing work, evaluating conditions,
and assisting with whatever they could do to help. For example, they observed and
questioned the continuous mining machine operators to find out if the debris had to be cut or
if it could just be loaded in order to determine the extent of load on the debris. For the most
part, the ground control specialists were not debriefed whenever they returned to the surface.
They stated that they would usually stop by the command center and tell whoever was there
what they observed. Due to the lack of formal debriefings, it is unclear how much of this
information the persons-in-charge were aware of. Although the specialists did attend some
meetings between MSHA and the company, it was on a limited basis.
Conclusion: MSHA failed to conduct a formal Risk versus Value analysis during the
underground rescue effort. While bounce evaluation parameters are not quantifiable like
those during a mine fire or explosion, and analyses of bounce activity can not be used to
predict when another bounce will occur, an attempt to establish some baseline measurement
could have been made.
Recommendation: MSHA should develop a program to train personnel in charge of rescue
and recovery operations. This training should include how to use all relevant information
available to evaluate the level of acceptable risk compared to the value that will be obtained.
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