Deaths of gold miners draw attention to State about Mine's safety record

Kenny Barbosa had a passion for fixing antique cars and drilling water wells, but the money the young father made mining gold kept him going underground.

[Sleibhin]

So it appears that the MSHA Inspectors get to play "god" re closing of Mines due to safety violations . Do they have a "play book" for deciding the seriousness of a serious safety violation? I guess they will say the rock falls were "acts of god".

The fines for violations certainly is not a deterent . It's a bloody joke.

"Small Mine Development received 55 citations from the agency for safety violations at the Getchell mine from January 2007 to early April 2008. Of those, 18 were classified as "serious and substantial." Fines for all the citations total ed less than $10,000.

11 times for poor ground support. All but two of those violations were considered serious. None, however, was categorized as "willful." For that reason, the mine avoided a closure order."