Blatant disregard

Dennis Roddy and Daniel Malloy of the Post-Gazette had a good story the other day about what allegedly was going on in the Upper Big Branch Mine in West Virginia before 29 miners were killed in an explosion April 5. According to the report, an electrician at the mine is saying that he was ordered to disable a methane detector on mining equipment. Apparently, that particular piece of equipment was not in the area where the deadly explosion occurred, but investigators are looking into the possibility that the same type of thing was done elsewhere in the mine. If it is found that shenanigans like this contributed to the disaster in that mine, and the deaths of 29 people, somebody should go to jail for a very, very long time. In China, they’d probably execute any executives whose deliberate actions, or orders, led to mass deaths. Maybe that’s not such a bad idea.