MEXICO: Worst Tragedy Belies Safety Claims

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, Feb 24 2006 (IPS) - The gas explosion that trapped 65 Mexican miners underground this week has cast a dark shadow on industry and government claims that safety standards are fully guaranteed in this booming sector, which has been largely privatised since the 1980s.

In the worst mining accident in modern Mexican history, 78 coal miners in the northern state of Coahuila were trapped underground Sunday by one or more explosions that took place over one kilometre below the surface. Thirteen of the miners were found alive by rescuers shortly after the accident occurred.

Dozens of miners, rescue workers and mining experts have been working nonstop since then in the frantic search for survivors. But due to the time that has elapsed and the poor quality of the air in the galleries of the mine, there is little to no hope that anyone will be found alive.

The accident took place just 16 days after the mine passed a routine safety inspection by the Secretariat of Labour.

“The tragedy in Coahuila not only reminds us that mining remains one of the most dangerous activities in the world, but serves as a wake-up call to the poor working conditions that persist in some Mexican mines,” mining engineer Antonio Madrigal told IPS.

At the Pasta de Conchos mine, where the accident occurred, miners earn between 160 and 310 dollars a month. Most of them are properly registered in the social security system, and their labour rights are respected.

The mine is owned by Grupo México, one of the biggest mining companies in Latin America, which extracts and processes gold, silver, zinc, copper, and coal. The firm, which has subsidiaries in Peru and Chile, also owns a railway network, and total revenues amounted to nearly 5.2 billion dollars in 2005, according to the company’s web site.

Grupo México’s vice-president for international relations, Juan Rebolledo, said the explosion in Pasta de Conchos was beyond the realm of any possible contingency plans for a mining company in normal conditions, and acknowledged that it was the worst accident in Mexican history.

An average of 1.3 miners die annually in roughly 50 accidents in this country of 104 million, which shows that the industry is one of the safest, according to authorities and industry sources.

Rebolledo said Mexico more than lives up to international mining safety standards.

But there is a huge gap between such claims and statements by workers at the Pasta de Conchos mine.

“Of all the mines where I have worked, safety here is really in the pits,” said Hervey Flores, one of the miners who was rescued.

Flores and others say that most of their fellow miners, including those who are still trapped underground, had been planning a strike to demand better safety measures.

In the tunnels that caved in, there were systems in place to detect the concentration of flammable gases. When levels get too high, alarm mechanisms are set off, and all electrical equipment is automatically shut off, to prevent explosions.

The workers say that although such systems were in place, in some cases the sensors are placed at ground level, thus failing to record dangerous gases, which accumulate near the ceiling.

“The explosion shows that there was too much gas, and the reason it wasn’t detected was not because of a failure of the machines, but because of the way they were handled,” said former miner Felipe García.

Napoleón Gómez, leader of the National Union of Mine and Metal Workers, said the extremely serious nature of the accident was an alert, and that his organisation would demand an inspection of all of the country’s mines, and better wages and safeguards for the workers.

But Madrigal said Gómez is in no position to speak, because for years he has been closer to government officials and business than to the country’s miners.

Like many Mexican trade unionists, Gómez belongs to the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which governed the country from 1929 to 2000, a period during which the trade unions had a cozy relationship with the government.

The accident in Coahuila took place during a boom period for Mexican mining, due to the growing international demand for minerals.

The mining industry provides direct employment for around 257,000 people, and output grew more than seven percent a year in 2004 and 2005, the highest growth since 1995.

According to the Mexican Chamber of Mines, the industry accounts for 1.6 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

Up to the 1980s, most of the country’s mines were operated by the state. But since then, a privatisation process was carried out, which has almost been completed.