The Media Disaster of the Utah Mining Disaster

From Why Are the New York Times and So Much of the Traditional* Media Neglecting a Vital Part of the Utah Mine Collapse Story?by Arianna Huffington

Yesterday, while speaking at the Aspen Institute’s Forum on Communications and Society, I commented on how the mainstream media have, with a few exceptions, been focusing on only one aspect of the Crandall Canyon Mine tragedy — the desperate attempt to rescue the trapped miners — while paying scant attention to investigating the reasons why these miners were trapped in the first place.

I specifically mentioned Sunday’s New York Times piece by Martin Stolz, who had been dispatched to Huntington to cover the story. Stolz’s report was filled with details about the progress rescuers had made through the collapsed mine (650 ft), and the capabilities of the hi-res camera being lowered into the mine (can pick up images from 100 ft away) — but not one word about what led to the collapse, including the role retreat mining might have played in it, or the 324 safety violations federal inspectors have issued for the mine since 2004.

The story, like most of the TV coverage, featured Bob Murray, the colorful co-owner of the mine. Stolz painted a picture of Murray emerging from the mine “with a coal-blackened face and in miner’s coveralls to discuss the latest finding with the families of the missing miners.”

Cue the swelling music and start the casting session. Your mind reflexively begins to wonder who would play Murray in the Crandall Canyon TV movie. Wilfred Brimley? Robert Duvall? Paul Newman?

Of course, Murray’s role in all this is much darker than that of the compassionate boss given to delivering script-ready lines like, “Conditions are the most difficult I have seen in my 50 years of mining” and “There are many reasons to have hope still” (as he has been quoted saying in two other Times stories).

He is a politically-connected Big Energy player whose company, Murray Energy Corp., has 19 mines in five states, which have incurred millions of dollars in fines for safety violations over the last 18 months.

Probably won’t see that in the TV movie.

Murray has also continued to insist that the mine collapse was the result of an earthquake — a claim disputed by seismologists.

So why has so much of the coverage focused on folksy Bob Murray, the stalwart and kindly mine owner, instead of mining mogul Robert Murray, who may have been at least partly responsible for decisions that led to the disaster?