Word: mined
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...TAKES A LOT of water to operate a coal tipple, and the one out on Buffalo Creek in Logan County, West Virginia was no exception. The tipple, owned by the Pittston Company through its Buffalo Mining subsidiary, used almost 500,000 gallons every day, two shifts a day and six days a week, pumping between 400 and 500 gallons of waste-filled water every minute. The waste was refuse from the coal mine, about 500 tons every day. Nobody knew what to do with...
...because the federal government decided that the Buffalo Mining Company couldn't dump this refuse-filled water into Buffalo Creek anymore (where it killed all the fish), the company began to build the first of three dams that would create ponds where it could dump the water. And the company could also kill two birds with one stone: it would build the dams out of the gob pile that just lay smoldering beside the mine--unhealthy situation that. You couldn't really call it a dam--no engineering, no overflow, no drains, just back some trucks up to the hollow...
...February, 1972, 3.72 inches of rain fell on Logan County, West Virginia--not unusual as the state climatologist would later testify. But it was enough, because there were no spillways built into the dam. On the morning of the 26th, Steve Dasovich, head of operations at the Buffalo mine, sent bulldozers to relieve pressure on the dam. It was too late for that, though. When they got to the dam a little before 7 a.m., it was gone. And 21 million cubic feet of water and God knows how many tons of mud and slag and crap were headed...
Steve Dasovich later admitted under oath that the tragedy could have been avoided if a drain ditch had been built. The construction would have meant closing down Buffalo's No. 5 mine for a few weeks, curtailing production. You do not get where Steve Dasovich is by curtailing production...
...even plan to wear my hat. A lot of demonstrators are expected across the street from the Garden in front of the post office, including thousands of Right To Lifers. Since they are in favor of right to life, I guess they will not endanger mine...