Owned by Whiteflame Energy

Penny Loeb is a distinguished author and the web designer for http://www.wvcoalfield.com , who has generously allowed her articles to be reprinted here.

Mining is nothing new for the residents of Ragland. The mountains around this community between Logan and Delbarton have been mined in some fashion since the 1930s. Many of the men in the community spent their working lives deep underground in tunnels stretching half a dozen miles.

Many Ragland residents don’t oppose the mines, underground or mountaintop. But they have seen so much damage, that they are angry—and frustrated that politicians and public officials fail to help them.

Ragland probably has more mine-related problems concentrated in a small area than many communities. With mines snaking under the community, it is virtually impossible to have a well that isn’t contaminated. So Ragland finally got a public water system about three years ago. But that system also draws its water from the deep mines. Those mines, often half a century old, are filled with discarded oil, asbestos, human waste and other potentially toxic chemicals. The public water is treated. But tests aren’t required for all contaminants in the mines. The public water to some people’s houses, including James Bailey’s, still has orange water and black residue. The Baileys drink only bottled water.

Since Ragland squeezes between the mountains and the river, most houses have no room for adequate septic systems. Many pour raw sewage directly into the river. Yet, government officials can’t find the money to extend the public sewer system to Ragland. “They built a flood wall for $275 million in Williamson. But we can’t even have water,” says one Ragland resident.

What concerns many Ragland residents the most is the slag dam near the top of the mountains. It stretches nearly three football fields across and is twice as long. Originally it was about 140 feet deep. But waste coal covers the bottom, so the water depth is considerably less. The watery dump was used for nearly 30 years until it reached capacity a few years ago. Since the dam sits nearly a mile off the road and reachable only on four wheelers and steep roads, those just passing through wouldn’t know it exists. But for the Ragland residents, it lies above the community, a dark watery reminder of the tragedy at Buffalo Creek. The community has been evacuated at least once because of concerns that dam would break. People who have worked around these kinds of dams find this one of the most worrisome. They believe it was improperly constructed, though improvements were made more recently.

Anyone driving to Ragland should proceed slowly. The overweight trucks are running several loads of coal a week out of the preparation plant to the railroad. Roads already weakened by winter weather are developing treacherous craters.

As if bad water, lack of public sewers, a looming lake and pot-holed roads weren’t enough. Soon a White Flame Energy mountaintop mine will move in at the end of one hollow.

One of the two valley fills on the Ragland side of the mine will come down this valley. The hillside on the left is built from waste coal that was dumped there in the 1980s and covered with a thin layer of soil. Patches of usable coal have risen to the surface of the hill. The coal is creating acid runoff that has turned the stream orange. James Bailey, whose house is closest to the valley fills, is worried that the hillside isn’t stable enough for the mine coming behind it.

Bailey and others have been notified that they are eligible for pre-blast surveys. However, some people who appear to live within half a mile (the required distance for notification) haven’t been notified. “They can blast within 300 feet of your home,” one resident said. “People don’t believe that.”

Penny Loeb is a distinguished author and the web designer for http://www.wvcoalfield.com , who has generously allowed her articles to be reprinted here.

It only took a few weeks. A generation of trees disappeared from the hollow behind Lonnie Dean’s home in the first weeks of December 1997. A thin, pink surveyor’s ribbon explains why. A valley fill is coming down the hollow behind Dean’s home. The ribbon marks the edge of the sedimentation pond—about 300 feet from Dean’s porch.

The White Flame Energy mine will stretch more than 800 acres over the mountain from Varney to Ragland on the other side. The valley fills are just a short ways up the road off of Route 52. Turn by the old lumberyard. In about half a mile, the road forks. The left one goes to Dean’s house. The right goes up over the mountain to Ragland. As you come up the mountain, the hillsides appear–clear cut in preparation for a valley fill. The mine plans to truck coal out down these narrow roads past the houses that hug the edges of the road.

More than 50 residents of Varney, Ragland and nearby communities crowded into the Varney School at the end of October for a public hearing on the mine. The DEP officials initially said it was a hearing only on a haulroad. The hearing officer said no one had requested a hearing or filed a protest when the mine was advertised in the paper. By law, mines are required to run legal notices with maps. However, the maps are small and the text of the ad does not fully explain what mining is going to be done. Many people fail to understand that a mine is proposed and that they have a certain amount of time to ask questions, protest or request a hearing.

The DEP hearing officer eventually let everyone speak about all aspects of the mine. Numerous residents made impassioned speeches. They said they feared that rocks from the blasting would land in the schoolyard or hit children at play. Others who have lost their wells because of deep mining were concerned about more water loss from the new mine.

DEP approved the permit for the mine in less than a month. Some restrictions were placed on blasting near the school.

Penny Loeb is a distinguished author and the web designer for http://www.wvcoalfield.com , who has generously allowed her articles to be reprinted here.

Around midnight, the water came down Lick Creek from the mine. Roaring, it rushed down the little stream, overflowing the banks. Black with dirt and coal waste, it stained the rocks and sand in the creek. At least three times in the past six years, torrents of water came off the mine in the middle of the night, according to people living near the creek. They say the mine had emptied out the sediment ponds at the valley fills. Or perhaps the water burst out of one of the deep mines up the mountain.

Two valley fills top Lick Creek and a tributary. The one on the right is finished now, but residents think that some of the black water came from this fill. Other black water came from a pit of mine water that was released into a tributary
of Lick Creek, according to a Division of Environmental Protection report of Feb. 27, 1996.

Black water in the creek is just one of several problems citizens believe come from the A.T. Massey mountaintop and deep mines surrounding and under their homes. Orange water, slides from the mine and blasting damage are among the other issues of concern in this community about five miles east of Williamson.

In the early 1990s, Larry Wilson (house on left of photo) had his well go dry. He drilled a new one, but the water is orange.

His family uses it for washing even though it has stained the inside of the washing machine. They must buy drinking water. Jean Roberts, who lives in the the house towards the center of the photograph, had to buy $5,000 worth of filters. Still her water often has small small black particles. Just about everyone along the creek has bad water, Wilson said. The only alternative is public water. Jean is skeptical of public water, too. It has too much chlorine, she said.

While mountaintop mining was going on about 1,000 feet up the stream, blasting was a bother. Some of the shots were hard enough to rattle the doors and windows.A leak developed in Jean’s son’s swimming pool after a blast.

One family had not one but two washouts come off the mine onto their yard. The first occurred in August 1996, according to a DEP report. It nearly closed the road, according to Jean. The next happened a couple of months later. As the DEP inspector wrote on Oct. 2, 1996: “Additional material has washed/slid/flowed down unnamed tributary hollow and deposited additional mud flows in Cooper yard. Cooper yard had been nearly cleaned up but will have to be done again.”