06/01/2024
This is a long post but, because it tells of whistleblowing by a concerned engineer alarmed by governmental corruption and intimidation, and the government's retaliation against him, you might want to read further.
I began operation of my consulting business JP Darby Services, LLC on February 1, 2023, just five days after retiring from a 33-year career as an Investigator/national union official with the United States Department of Labor (DOL).
For the last 29 years, Mr. Chad Huntley has been an electrical engineer with DOL's Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), Approval and Certification Center (A&CC) in Triadelphia, West Virginia (located in the Northern Panhandle). He is my second client ever.
For almost three years, Chad has raised issues about a piece of equipment called a Continuous Personal Dust Monitor (CPDM) that MSHA forces mining companies to buy at $22,000 each (the industry has had to spend some $60,000,000 thus far on CPDMs). The control of respirable dust such as coal dust and silica dust is a laudable goal; too many hundreds of thousands of miners have become sickened and/or killed by Black Lung Disease (pneumoconiosis) and Silicosis over the last 100+ years. CPDMs are powered by lithium-ion batteries. You may know that one of the questions asked before you mail a package or before you get on an airline is if you have any lithium-ion batteries. These batteries burn at high heat and fast speed.
The one manufacturer of CPDMs is Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc. (New York Stock Exchange symbol TMO).
Previously, MSHA inspectors used "dust pumps" and "dust cartridges" to measure airborne dust particles in underground mines. These did not give instantaneous answers because the dust cartridges had to be analyzed at a laboratory. Instantaneous answers are not needed (the damage done by respirable dust particles is done over decades), but "instantaneous" is more convenient for the government. Because MSHA wanted "instantaneous", they mandated that the mining industry buy and use CPDMs.
In 2014, MSHA approved the use of CPDMs in underground coal mines and ordered their use. It is VERY IMPORTANT to note that anything carried beyond a certain point in a coal mine must be "intrinsically safe", that is, "...INCAPABLE of causing a fire or explosion". Intrinsic safety has been MSHA's rule for decades.
In August 2021, a CPDM caught fire at the Warrior Met Number 7 coal mine in Brookwood, Alabama. "Met" coal is metallurgical coal, a high-quality coal used in steelmaking and other metallurgical industries. This mine, and many others in Alabama, are "gassy mines" (they have high levels of methane). The CPDM or one of the lithium-ion batteries powering it caught fire (remember, it's supposed to be "INCAPABLE of causing a fire or explosion"). It's a small miracle that the fire didn't lead to a larger fire or an explosion in the mine. On September 23, 2001, an adjacent mine (Jim Walters No. 5) had exploded, killing 13, so mine safety is a big deal in Brookwood, Alabama.
Chad was an acting supervisor at MSHA's Approval and Certification Center from mid-September 2021 to the end of December 2021. He was very aware of the MSHA investigation assigned to his colleagues at the A&CC in Triadelphia. He knew that a preliminary report in December 2021 surmised that the CPDM or one of the lithium-ion batteries powering it had caught fire.
In the summer of 2022, he asked coworkers and his supervisor what the status was of the investigation. His supervisor basically told him to mind his own business. Chad raised the matter in October 2022 during his yearly performance appraisal with his supervisor and his supervisor's supervisor. Again, nothing from the MSHA bureaucracy.
Beginning in February 2023 and lasting for eight months, Chad was forced to sit at home doing nothing because he was being investigated by the powers that be in MSHA due to his whistleblowing activity (of course, management blamed the investigation on something else, but it was the equivalent of putting lipstick on a pig).
On May 16, 2023, I filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with DOL. The primary reason was to get all of MSHA's inside information about CPDMs. Along the words of the congressional committee that investigated Watergate 50 years ago, "What did the government know, and when did the government know it?"
FOIA requires the government to answer the requestor within 20 business days and to either provide the requested records or to claim an exemption against the provision of the records. That would have been in mid-June 2023. Hearing nothing, I filed a lawsuit against DOL on September 5, 2023 in United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Beaumont Division styled "JP Darby Services, LLC v. Julie Su, Acting Secretary of Labor", 1:23cv331. Through a production schedule negotiated between the U. S. Attorney's Office and me, DOL has been providing me these records on the first Friday evening of the month since March.
Mr. Huntley and I talked with Steve Fiscor, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of "Coal Age Magazine" on May 9. Since then, we have had several email exchanges. Mr. Fiscor said his article would be published in the May 2024 edition of "Coal Age Magazine" and be available this afternoon or evening. I checked it an hour ago, and found the article in the May 2024 edition (see the link below). The subscribers will receive hard copies beginning next week. These subscribers include companies, unions, attorneys, and members of Congress.
While Mr. Huntley is quoted at length in the article (this is his matter, after all), I got mentioned toward the end of the "Editor's Notes" on Page 2 of the magazine.
I believe in safety and health. The previous system of measuring dust was older and slower, yet time-tested. Speed doesn't count here, long-term accuracy does. Taking anything into a coal mine that can cause a fire or explosion violates the government's own rules, yet the government is forcing the coal companies to buy them and the coal miners to wear them. A mine fire or explosion is not safe or healthy.
I thank Steve Fiscor for taking this seriously. Mr. Huntley and I have been trying to find a media outlet since August 2023 who might be interested in this issue. I hope Mr. Fiscor's article will lead to positive changes for Mr. Huntley and for American miners.
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