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26–116 PDF 2006

S. HRG. 109–379

ROUNDTABLE ON COMMUNICATION AND MINE

SAFETY TECHNOLOGY

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT 

AND WORKPLACE SAFETY

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION, 

LABOR, AND PENSIONS

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

ON

EXAMINING COMMUNICATION AND MINE SAFETY TECHNOLOGY ISSUES

FEBRUARY 15, 2006

Printed for the use of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION, LABOR, AND PENSIONS 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming, Chairman 

JUDD GREGG, New Hampshire 

WILLIAM H. FRIST, Tennessee 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

RICHARD BURR, North Carolina 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

PAT ROBERTS, Kansas 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut 

TOM HARKIN, Iowa 

BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, Maryland 

JAMES M. JEFFORDS, Vermont 

JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico 

PATTY MURRAY, Washington 

JACK REED, Rhode Island 

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York

KATHERINE BRUNETT MCGUIRE, Staff Director 

J. MICHAEL MYERS, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel

SUBCOMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE SAFETY

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia, Chairman 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

RICHARD BURR, North Carolina 

JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada 

PAT ROBERTS, Kansas 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming (ex officio) 

PATTY MURRAY, Washington 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut 

TOM HARKIN, Iowa 

BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, Maryland 

JAMES M. JEFFORDS (I), Vermont 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts (ex 

officio)

GLEE SMITH, Staff Director 

WILLIAM KAMELA, Minority Staff Director 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2006

Page

Isakson, Hon. Johnny, Chairman, Subcommittee on Employment and Workplace Safety, opening statement ......................................................................... 1

Murray, Hon. Patty, a U.S. Senator from the State of Washington, opening 

statement .............................................................................................................. 2 

Enzi, Hon. Michael B., Chairman, Committee on Health, Education, Labor, 

and Pensions, prepared statement ..................................................................... 3

Campman, Bob, president, Grace Industries; Pat Droppleman, president, 

Ocenco Corporation; Dr. R. Larry Grayson, chair, Department of Mining 

and Nuclear Engineering, University of Missouri-Rolla; Wes Kenneweg, 

president, Draeger Industries; Dr. Roy Nutter, Professor, College of Engineering and Mineral Resources, West Virginia University; Dennis O’Dell, 

Administrator, Health and Safety Programs, UMWA; Sam Shearer, president, CSE Corporation; Dr. Starnes Walker, technical director, Office of 

Naval Research, U.S. Navy; and Gary Zamel, president, Mine Site Technologies PTY. LTD ............................................................................................... 3

Prepared statements of: 

Mr. Droppleman ........................................................................................ 7

Mr. Nutter .................................................................................................. 15

Mr. Shearer ................................................................................................ 20

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL 

Statements, articles, publications, letters, etc.: 

Letter from Sago Miners to the Dominion Post ............................................. 45

3M White Paper ................................................................................................ 46

InnerSpace Systems Corporation .................................................................... 47

Response to questions of the subcommittee by Wes Kenneweg, Draeger 

Safety, Inc. ..................................................................................................... 49

(1)

ROUNDTABLE ON COMMUNICATION AND 

MINE SAFETY TECHNOLOGY 

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2006

U.S. SENATE, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE SAFETY, 

COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION, LABOR, AND PENSIONS, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m., in room 

SD–430, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Johnny Isakson, 

chairman of the subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Isakson, Murray, Kennedy, and Clinton. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR ISAKSON

Senator ISAKSON. Good morning. I would like to welcome everybody to this subcommittee hearing, and for the benefit of everyone 

that is here, let me tell you what the ground rules are. This is not 

a situation where members of the Senate are coming to make 

speeches. I talked to the other members who will be coming, and 

when Senator Murray arrives—she is my ranking member—she 

will make a brief statement, and I am going to make a brief statement, but beyond that, this is about learning about the technologies that exist, the ones we hope will exist, and mechanisms 

to get to the existence of those technologies to make mine safety 

in the United States of America even better. 

The reason we asked the Senators not to make opening statements is so we could get the information from this very, very distinguished panel. What set the stage for this hearing was a trip 

that Senator Kennedy, who is arriving now, myself, Senator Rockefeller and Senator Enzi took about a month ago to the Sago mine 

following the tragedy that took place in early January. 

In going on that fact-finding trip, which included an extensive 2-

hour visit with the families, we learned there were critical areas 

of need to improve mine safety, technologies that were maybe 

emerging but did not necessarily exist. I felt compelled as chairman 

of this subcommittee to create a forum where we could be prospective in the future about what we can do to make mining more safe 

rather than retrospective in trying to find blame for an incident 

that has happened and is being investigated. 

I will reduce my remarks to one simple thing. This is a picture 

of Junior Hammer. Junior—this was taken on the day after Christmas of last year—I sat next to his daughter when we met with the 

families in West Virginia. As I was getting up to leave, she slipped 

this picture into my hand and she said whatever you do, try and 

2

make sure no other young lady loses their daddy the way I lost 

mine. And I think for all of us that this meeting is about Junior 

Hammer and the other individuals who have lost their lives in 

mining accidents. 

Last point, at the Sago incident, in particular, because that is 

where we visited, it was quite clear that technology for two-way 

communication or better communication from the surface to the 

mine could possibly have saved lives. It was also important to understand that accessibility to more than 1 hour’s oxygen in one 

method or another could also have saved lives from the standpoint 

of the miners trapped being able to get out, more so than the miners on the outside and rescue teams being able to get in. 

So we are here today to hear from each of you, and Senator Kennedy, thank you for coming. We are waiving opening statements to 

get right to the information. 

Here comes my ranking member now. Her timing is always impeccable. Ladies always know how to make an entrance. 

Senator MURRAY. That is right. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ISAKSON. I have said my 3 minutes and yours are allocated, and it is a pleasure for me to introduce my ranking member, 

Patty Murray, for her statement. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR MURRAY

Senator MURRAY. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much for organizing this roundtable to help us look at all the ways that we can 

help protect America’s miners. There is a lot of really impressive 

technology that we could be using to help make mining safer, and 

I really look forward to working with our chairman today to explore 

some of those ideas. 

Families in West Virginia have really endured tragedies that 

very few of us can weigh. We cannot undo what happened and we 

cannot know what they are going through, but we can resolve to 

work together to give our miners better protection, and this is why 

we are all here today. 

Mr. Chairman, I do want to say I really appreciate the bipartisan 

way that you and your staff have worked to put together this 

forum today and I always appreciate your inclusive leadership here 

on this subcommittee, and I want you to know I look forward to 

working with you to review and update some of the mine safety 

laws and regulations that are on the books. 

The tragedies in West Virginia have really focused our Government’s attention on the thousands of brave men who enter our coal 

mines everyday to produce the energy that our Nation relies on. 

We have to do more to make sure that if there is an incident, they 

have access to oxygen and that they can communicate with others 

and come out alive. 

These tragedies have brought out the best in our fellow Americans who are interested in looking for ways to reduce or prevent 

the loss of life in the mines. Over the last month, my office has 

been contacted by numerous engineers, scientists, and health and 

safety professionals with a lot of new ideas and advances in mine 

safety technology. I look forward to hearing from our experts on 

3

our roundtable this morning and seeing some of the new products 

and technologies that are going to be demonstrated. 

We are also working on legislation. Our colleagues from West 

Virginia have already introduced legislation to bring new mine 

safety technologies into the industry, and I know that Senator 

Rockefeller has developed legislation to provide tax incentives for 

coal mine operators to invest in some of the new safety measures. 

Mr. Chairman, I hope that as we move forward, we will not allow 

the perfect to be the enemy of the good. We know that every technology has limits and nothing is foolproof, but if there are steps we 

can take to make progress, I do not think we should hold back. 

So we have an important mission and I again want to thank our 

chairman and Senator Kennedy who is here as well and all of our 

witnesses who have come to share with us new ways to help make 

and keep our miners safe. 

Thank you very much. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, Senator Murray. 

At this time I would like to submit a statement for the record 

from Senator Enzi, Chairman of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Enzi follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR ENZI

Thank you, Senator Isakson. Let me begin by noting how much 

I appreciate your leadership and work in organizing this roundtable on mine safety technology. 

A few short weeks ago, Senator Isakson and I, along with Senators Kennedy and Rockefeller, traveled to West Virginia to meet 

with the families of the miners who perished at the Sago mine. It 

was, for all of us, an emotional experience; and, one which reinforced our commitment to do all that we can to ensure the health 

and safety of miners everywhere. 

Coming from Wyoming, I have had a long-standing interest and 

concern for all those who earn their living in the mines. Wyoming 

is rich in the earth’s natural resources. It is, for example, the largest coal producer in the Nation, shipping some 1 million tons of 

coal a day. Because mining is so central to our way of life, all of 

us in Wyoming share a bond with miners everywhere, including 

those who lost their lives in West Virginia. 

Today’s roundtable is one more step in translating our concern 

into action. While the investigation of the recent mine tragedies in 

West Virginia are not yet complete; and, while it is therefore not 

appropriate to engage in speculation, these tragedies have already 

made amply clear certain areas that demand our immediate attention. Of all these areas perhaps none is more important than the 

role of technology in making our mines safer. 

One of the most disappointing things I have learned as I have 

taken a closer look at the underground coal mining industry is 

what the current technology cannot do. There are no devices to 

allow wireless two-way phone communications in an underground 

mine. Nor are there devices that would allow two-way text messaging; so that miners could let the surface know what happened, 

and where they are, and so they could receive directions to enhance 

their chances of survival. The current portable oxygen devices do 

4

not contain enough oxygen to sustain miners for long periods of 

time. Even the rescue team members oxygen supply is less than it 

should be. I understand the enormous difficulties of making technology work under hundreds of feet of rock. However, like many of 

my colleagues, I am baffled by the fact that the tremendous technological advances of recent years have apparently not been more significantly translated into new mine technology. 

As the witness list for today’s roundtable indicates, some of the 

technology innovations of recent years have come from Australia, 

another nation with a thriving mining industry. Companies there 

have developed methods to send text messages deep underground 

using extremely low frequencies, to track what underground areas 

miners have been in from the surface, and have created mine refuge systems capable of sustaining life for up to 36 hours. 

While some U.S. mines are already using these or similar products, since this year’s tragic spike in fatal accidents, mine companies across the country are looking at new technologies and determining what would work best in their mines. In fact, it is my understanding that the Australian company here today, Mine Site 

Technology, was founded in response to a mine accident in Queensland that killed 12 miners in 1986. It is impossible to ignore the 

sad irony that fatal accidents spur new developments. This is 

something I hope to address as the HELP Committee considers its 

legislative response to these issues. 

Like the families of the victims we met with at Sago, I want to 

know why. I want to know why technology has not advanced farther than the current level; why the best technology available is 

not more widely utilized; if MSHA is doing enough to quickly review and promote new technologies; and how the millions of taxpayers’ dollars which have been invested in research to protect 

miners safety and health have been spent. Getting the answers to 

these questions is critical to our shared goal of improving miner 

safety through technology. 

But we must also be careful not to cast out false hope. In the period since the Sago tragedy, much has been said about the mine 

technologies which were not in use there. Not all of it has been accurate. Even more dangerous, legislative proposals have been offered, and some even adopted, which mandate the use of technology 

which simply does not exist. We all wish that it did exist, and I 

believe it will some day soon. Yet, a mandate which is impossible 

to fulfill is no help at all to those who go into the mines everyday. 

As Congress and the Administration act to correct the deficits exposed by this year’s mining tragedies, we must keep two tracks in 

mind. First, we must look to the future and encourage the development of better mine technologies. Second, we must be realistic 

about presently existing technologies. Overstating something’s capabilities does not make it so, it just offers false hope. Mandating 

costly technologies that have no chance of saving lives in another 

mining accident will not save lives, it will merely eliminate jobs by 

driving some mines out of business. 

The 19 miners who have lost their lives this year, and their families, deserve more than false hope. I look forward to working with 

my fellow HELP Committee members and the Senators from West 

5

Virginia to find real ways to develop and encourage utilization of 

new technologies which will make our mines safer. 

Senator ISAKSON. Here we will proceed as follows. In just a second, Mr. Campman, I will recognize you first to introduce yourself. 

We would like for you to take about 3 minutes to introduce yourselves and say any statement that you would like to as far as your 

interest in this to kick off the meeting, after which time we intend 

to have a dialogue of exchange between the members and yourselves or yourselves together talking prospectively about what we 

can do to make mining more safe given your area of expertise or 

the products you might have or have developed. 

So with that said, we will start with Mr. Campman. 

STATEMENTS OF BOB CAMPMAN, PRESIDENT, GRACE INDUSTRIES; PAT DROPPLEMAN, PRESIDENT, OCENCO CORPORATION; DR. R. LARRY GRAYSON, CHAIR, DEPARTMENT OF 

MINING AND NUCLEAR ENGINEERING, UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI-ROLLA; WES KENNEWEG, PRESIDENT, DRAEGER INDUSTRIES; DR. ROY NUTTER, PROFESSOR, COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING AND MINERAL RESOURCES, WEST VIRGINIA 

UNIVERSITY; DENNIS O’DELL, ADMINISTRATOR, HEALTH 

AND SAFETY PROGRAMS, UMWA; SAM SHEARER, PRESIDENT, 

CSE CORPORATION; DR. STARNES WALKER, TECHNICAL DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF NAVAL RESEARCH, U.S. NAVY; AND 

GARY ZAMEL, PRESIDENT, MINE SITE TECHNOLOGIES PTY. 

LTD 

Mr. CAMPMAN. Thank you, Senator. It is a both a pleasure and 

privilege to be here and I think that we are going to show you some 

technologies here that really will help mine safety. My name is Bob 

Campman. I am the Vice President of Research and Development 

for Grace Industries Incorporated. We are a company who has designed and developed many personal life safety products, particularly catered to the firefighter service, however, the product has direct application to mine safety. 

Our company has been in business over 30 years producing these 

types of products and our specialty is bringing the forefront of technology into product form to improve life safety. Some of the products that we have brought with us, which I will elaborate on later 

on in our meeting here, certainly will improve miner safety and 

also I think workplace safety in general. 

So with that said, Grace Industries, again, being in business for 

30 years, producing these types of products, recently after our 9/

11 disaster, our company was contacted by the New York City command staff to come up with an evacuate system for firefighters. As 

we know, over 100 firefighters lost their lives in the collapse of the 

second tower. 

The incident commanders came to Grace and wanted a standalone evacuate system for firefighters. After a couple of years of development, about 4 years ago, we delivered on our promise, and developed what we call our T-PASS 3 system. And what this is is a 

high performance radio signaling system used by firefighters as a 

panic button alarm, as a motion sensing man-down alarm. By the 

way, PASS is an acronym for Personal Alert Safety System. And 

6

of course to send an evacuate signal to these firefighters in the 

event of an emergency. 

Our company, since we have introduced the T-PASS 3, has sold 

this to over 350 departments so far nationwide in the past 3 years. 

The product has direct application to mine safety. Recently we 

have begun some testing in working with NIOSH and MSHA on a 

very initial preliminary basis here the past couple of weeks to set 

up some testing for our product in mine use. 

Some of the strengths our company has and our products have 

are they are intrinsically safe which means they can be brought 

into a methane environment, which is very common in a coal mine. 

Other products that we have include locating technology, which 

we are currently developing, that could also be used to track and 

locate miners within a mine. Later on in the meeting, I would like 

to elaborate and show you some of the technology demonstrated for 

you and perhaps indicate how I think our system can improve mine 

safety. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, and I commend you as a witness. 

The red light went off and you were finished. Can you see the red 

light? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. Yes. 

Senator ISAKSON. That is what the red light means. Some of us 

do not pay much attention to that, but we are delighted when you 

do. 

Mr. Droppleman. 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. Thank you. Thank you, Senator, for inviting 

me and for including our company in this important discussion. I 

have prepared a written statement and have submitted it for inclusion. 

My name is Pat Droppleman. I am President of Ocenco Incorporated. Our company is headquartered in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin. I happen to be a native of West Virginia from Doddridge 

County, West Virginia, and I grew up near Farmington where the 

Farmington mine disaster took place in the 1960s, and I have monitored and watched and been involved in the mining industry since 

1970. 

Our company operates from 12 locations in ten countries on four 

continents and we are involved in mine safety in most of those locations. We build compressed oxygen breathing apparatus for firefighters, for military applications. We build bailout units for fighter 

aircraft. Every F16 pilot has an escape breathing apparatus that 

we manufacture. We make very sophisticated rebreathers for mine 

clearance work for the Navy. We can take a diver to 91 meters, 

keep him underwater for 5 hours, and do that totally stealth and 

totally silent. 

In all of the applications from our medical company to our firefighting to the mine escape breathing apparatus to shipboard escape apparatus, we have chosen to use compressed oxygen technology because we believe that it offers the greatest opportunity 

and the greatest flexibility in terms of performance and reliability. 

During the discussions, I am sure you are going to hear a lot of 

discussion about chemical oxygen generators versus compressed oxVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
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ygen generators. I do not think that is the issue here. I think the 

issue here is, there are two basic fundamental problems. 

The first problem is that the current regulations do not recognize 

the difference in performance between approved 60-minute self-regulators. It is absolutely fundamental to escape——

Senator KENNEDY. Could you say that again? I did not hear it. 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. I said the current regulations do not recognize 

the fundamental differences between approved 60-minute self-rescuers, and that is critical to understanding and developing an escape strategy in the event of a fire and explosion, and I will come 

back and address that. 

The second fundamental problem is that the regulations do not 

speak to protecting the miner from where he is in the mine to a 

place of safety, preferably to the outside. Those of us that have 

spent our career in mining know in the event of a fire and explosion, we have one objective: if we survive the initial incident, we 

want to be outside. And that will always be the number one objective of a miner. 

The regulations should recognize that and should support efforts 

on the part of mines to protect the worker from where he is in the 

mine to the outside. That is not possible with one belt-worn 60-

minute self-rescuer. 

Those two issues, if we address those two issues in terms of selfcontained self-rescuers, then we will take a huge step toward protecting miners. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Droppleman follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF J. P. DROPPLEMAN

Ocenco, Incorporated is pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this important discussion about coal mine safety and the use and deployment of Self-Contained Self-Rescuers (SCSRs) in underground mines. 

Ocenco manufactures SCSRs, or EEBDs (Emergency Escape Breathing Apparatus), for military, marine, industrial, aviation and mining applications. In addition, we manufacture sophisticated rebreathers for military mine clearance work 

and Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA) for professional firefighters. 

Ocenco’s Erie Medical Division manufactures a wide variety of oxygen valves and 

regulators for medical oxygen therapy applications. Ocenco’s Interspiro Division has 

been the leader in CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear) hardened 

SCBAs for the first responder market, and our ABMS-3 (Automated Breathing Metabolic Simulator) is used by NIOSH, Aberdeen Proving Ground and the U.S. Navy 

for both breathing apparatus approval and research. 

Mine Worker Safety Objectives 

Our Nation’s goals for mine workers, as they relate to respiratory protection during escape from fires and or explosions, must be to get all underground workers to 

a place of safety—preferably the outside. 

Technology of SCSRs 

There are two basic technologies currently being used to provide oxygen to miners 

for escape from fires and or explosions: (1) compressed oxygen and (2) chemical oxygen generators. 

In all applications—mine escape, underwater mine clearance, fighter aircraft bail 

out systems, firefighting apparatus and medical oxygen therapy—Ocenco has chosen 

to use compressed oxygen technology because it offers the greatest flexibility and 

reliability in terms of design and performance. 

Ocenco does not recommend that Congress or MSHA select only one of these technologies for use in underground mines. In fact, we believe it is essential to allow 

mines to choose among competing technologies, not only those available on the marVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
8

ket today but those that may be developed. However, it is essential that any system 

be evaluated based on performance under realistic conditions. 

Successful Escape Factors 

There are four requirements that must be met to effect a successful self rescue 

from a mine fire or explosion. 

1. Accessibility—the miner must have access to an oxygen supply device. 

2. Training—the miner must know how to use the device. 

3. Performance—the device must work. 

4. Duration—the devices must provide enough oxygen to get the miner to a place 

of safety—preferably the outside. 

It is essential that policymakers and the public understand that the performance 

of breathing devices varies dramatically. There is a tendency to assume that the 

usefulness of a device can be measured simply based on the rated duration of the 

oxygen supply. For example, one might assume that a 1-hour breathing device 

mounted on the miner’s belt is better for the miner than a 10-minute device on the 

belt. That is not true. The issue is what is available to the miner when disaster 

occurs—not simply the device on his belt, but the reliability of the device and the 

proximity and performance of breathing devices stored nearby. In making this determination, policymakers must be realistic about what miners do every day. Large 

and heavy devices interfere with the ability to work and encourage the miner to remove the bulky device from his belt. In addition, large devices are subject to damage 

from shock and impact when worn on the belt. 

Current Regulations 

The current regulations for approved SCSRs are found in 30 CFR §§ 75.1714 

through 75.1714-3. Today, MSHA regulations give mines three choices to protect 

miners from loss of oxygen. For each miner and authorized visitor, the mine can 

choose to provide any of the following:

1. A 1-hour SCSR, which is carried by the miner. Once this device is provided, 

the mine needs to provide no additional protection. § 75.1714-1(a). Ordinarily, the 

miner should wear the device, but under some circumstances the device can be kept 

nearby. § 75.1714-2(b)-(e). 

2. A SCSR of not less than 10 minutes and a 1-hour canister stored nearby. 

§ 75.1714-1(b). The 10-minute device is ordinarily carried by the miner. The 1-hour 

canister must be available at all times to all persons when underground in accordance with a storage plan submitted by the operator of the mine and approved by 

the District Manager. § 75.1714-2(g)(2). 

3. Any other self-contained breathing apparatus which provides protection for a 

period of 1 hour or longer and which is approved for use by MSHA as a self rescue 

device when used and maintained as prescribed by MSHA. § 75.1714-1(c). No additional protection has to be offered. 

Weaknesses in the Current Regulations 

There are two fundamental problems with the current regulations: 

1. The current regulations do not recognize the significant performance 

differences among approved 60-minute SCSRs. 

The regulations have been implemented based on the assumption that a 60-

minute breathing device will necessarily and completely protect the miner. That is 

not true. The regulations, regardless of the device used, should focus on performance 

and the benefits for the miner, not arbitrary breathing times. It is impossible to determine performance without testing under realistic conditions. 

Example: One 60-minute approved SCSR supplies 157 liters of oxygen while another 60-minute approved SCSR supplies 82 liters. Clearly, there is a significant difference in performance for these two SCSRs. The 157 liter compressed oxygen device 

will last over 7 hours if a miner remains at rest. A 60-minute SCSR using a different technology lasts a much shorter period. 

2. The current regulations do not require each mine to have an approved 

plan that ensures the miner will have enough oxygen to reach a place of 

safety—preferably the outside. 

Every mine should be required to submit a plan for protecting the miner from loss 

of breathable air—regardless of the type of SCSR used. MSHA should review and 

approve each plan to ensure that the miner is protected. This is not the case now. 

The bottom line is that miners must have an approved plan and equipment that 

allows them to survive a disaster. The regulations should not force a ‘‘one size fits 

all’’ solution. 

Ocenco’s Recommendations 

Ocenco recommends the following: 

9

• Neither Congress nor MSHA should mandate that a particular SCSR technology be used. 

• The regulations should require all mines to submit a storage and escape plan 

that gets the miner to the surface. This requirement should apply regardless of the 

duration or technology of SCSR used. 

• The storage and escape plan should be verified using in-mine escape trials with 

mine personnel. The test should be designed to demonstrate that SCSRs will perform under real-life underground mining conditions and get the miner to the surface.


26116-1.eps
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Senator ISAKSON. Dr. Grayson. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Yes, sir. I will read mine into the record. Dear 

Honorable Committee Members: I would like to dispense with other 

than a very brief introduction of myself and just suffice it to say 

that I was a coal miner, production foreman, and also a superintendent of about a 500 person underground mine, and I deeply 

cared for the miners under my charge. 

I am still very close to my friends in my former UMWA crew, 

and it was that admiration and respect for good people that led me 

to mine safety as an area of research emphasis in my career. I hope 

that all of us involved in reshaping the mine safety provisions this 


26116-4.eps
13

year will focus intently on increasing significantly the odds of survival for all underground miners in times of emergencies. 

Emergency situations actually vary widely by location in a mine 

relative to where the workers actually are, the extent of the damage wrought from very local to very large spatially, and then finally 

in their probability of trapping the miners from escape. 

Thus, a combination of information age technologies, rescue and 

response procedures, and technology and preparedness training are 

demanded in order to reach a new level of protection for our underground coal miners. 

I have come to know that technology, no technology can actually 

work perfectly all the time as you had stated. Even the very good 

ones have blips from time to time. Every technology does have 

flaws. It is developed during a bad manufacturing run or possibly 

evolving over time, and vulnerabilities to certain conditions, especially fires and explosions. 

Thus, as we seek new safety implementations, I believe it is important that we examine in detail the various emergency situations 

or scenarios that have occurred, discern where and how the miners 

became vulnerable, and then couple these scenarios up with the 

technologies that can best increase significantly the odds of miner 

survival in these specific situations, and admittedly there will be 

no single answer. It is going to be a combination. 

During today’s proceedings, I will do my best to respond to your 

questions and blend optimism for specific technologies with reality 

concerning steps needed to ensure that the technologies will deliver 

on what will ultimately become, I believe, an implied guarantee to 

our underground miners that they will not have to worry so much 

anymore when we are done about emergency situations. 

Recognizing the role of technology and how it must play to advance mine safety, the National Mining Association announced the 

formation of an independent Mine Safety Technology and Training 

Commission. I have agreed to chair the commission. The commission will have a balanced membership that will bring a full range 

of perspectives to address these issues. 

Yesterday, it was announced that eight of the nine members 

have already been confirmed and soon will complement the group 

with the additional communications technology person. My goal is 

to report the commission’s preliminary findings by early July and 

have a final report by the end of September. I assure you that the 

commission will be keeping its independent information-gathering 

deliberations and recommendations focused on what you are focusing on today. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Kenneweg. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Yes, thank you for inviting Draeger to this important——

Senator ISAKSON. Make sure the microphone is close to you. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Again, thank you for the invitation to be part of 

this discussion. My name is Wes Kenneweg. I am the President 

and CEO of Draeger North America. Draeger is a worldwide company that primarily manufactures or develops and manufacturers 

respiratory protection equipment and gas detection equipment. 

14

This includes mine rescue breathing apparatus, oxygen self-rescuers, refuge stations, gas detection equipment for combustible 

gases such as methane, carbon monoxide, toxic gases and oxygen 

deficiency. 

The company is 117 years old. North America’s base is in Pittsburgh. We have been there since 1907. Primarily we are based in 

Pittsburgh because of the concentration of mining in that area so 

it has been a big part of the Draeger philosophy to provide products and use our engineering and technology for mining. 

And I have worked with Draeger for 23 years, partly in the U.S., 

in Canada, and also in Australia, and all those locations I was involved in mining and regarding mine rescue. What we have to 

offer, and we can discuss in more detail later, is our expertise in 

self-rescuers. 

These are some self-rescuers here, two oxygen and an older filter 

device, which is also still in use in the mines. There are some 

things I think with the approvals, the test standards, the testing 

equipment, the regulations that require certain duration time limit 

on the oxygen rescuers underground. Those need to be possibly 

more flexible and that would give the manufacturers an opportunity to make better use of their technologies. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much. 

Dr. Nutter. 

Mr. NUTTER. Good morning. My name is Roy Nutter. I am a professor of computer science and electrical engineering at West Virginia University. I have done research in underground communications and applying computers and automation in underground 

mines, coal mines, since about 1969, I guess. 

A few things I would like to say as we begin. One of the things 

that I hear happening when we start talking about communications, and I am going to put my education hat on here if it is all 

right, is I draw the line at incident, at the explosion. Pre-incident, 

pre-explosion, people are coming out of the woodwork to communicate pre-incident. There are many companies selling radios, leaky 

feeder cables, underground telephones, all kinds of equipment, and 

some of the mines, many of the mines have these installed. 

At incident or at explosion, though, I describe it as looking down 

the barrel of a shotgun. The thing goes off and all the infrastructure, all the cable, all the wires, everything that is under there is 

gone, destroyed, shot out of the end of that gun. 

Now is when we need to communicate, postincident. Before is an 

issue, but postincident is more important. What we are hearing is, 

and I will talk about PED for a minute, is essentially a pager from 

above ground to underground. That is fine, and that is certainly a 

first step. We do need to communicate, though, from underground 

to above ground as well postincident. 

One of the problems, and you will probably hear this later, one 

of the problems with these type systems is noise affects them. Mining equipment noise, powerline noise, atmospherics affects it, so 

they are not always reliable in all places. Unfortunately or maybe 

fortunately, after the explosion, power is off. A lot of that noise 

goes away. So bi-directional communications is probably much 

more doable postexplosion with power off. 

15

And I think with that, I will stop. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Roy Nutter follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF ROY NUTTER

I am Roy Nutter. I am a Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at West Virginia University. I hold a BS, MS, and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from West Virginia University. After completing my Ph.D. in 1971, I spent 2 

years with NCR developing microprocessor based equipment for the banking industry, I returned to WVU to teach electrical and computer engineering where I have 

remained in various capacities since 1974. While a graduate student, I worked 

under Dr. M. Dayne Aldridge on research in underground communications. Following my return to WVU in 1974, I concentrated on applying computers and communications to underground coal mining. I was named a Fellow of the IEEE in 1993 

this work in mining. I have published many papers and hold several patents in 

areas of communications and computer controls. 

Background 

Before answering your questions about underground communications, let me set 

the stage for understanding better the communications situation in underground 

coal mines. Consider dividing the problem into ‘‘PRE’’ incident and ‘‘POST’’ incident. 

The pre-incident situation is the normal everyday coal mine that is in production. 

The normal methods of communications work and work fairly well. These include 

wired standard telephones, mine pager phones, trolley phones, and leaky feeder radios fed by an infrastructure of repeaters and cabling. 

Once an incident becomes an explosion, it is like looking into the barrel of a shotgun. Once it goes off, ALL infrastructure that is in the mine entry is blown out and 

destroyed. Little survives the explosion in the immediate vicinity. If the gas explosion stirs up enough coal dust, a coal dust explosion then goes off as well further 

clearing out any items that remained in the entryways. Entries far away from the 

explosion area may or may not be affected. 

Postincident then is the postexplosion, immediate postdisaster coal mine. Telephone lines and communications infrastructure are simply gone; trolley lines and 

track can be blown out; overburden may have collapsed into the entryways and escape-ways; and the explosion can be so strong as to blow a wooden 2x4 lengthwise 

through a steel I beam. Electrical power is now generally off all over the mine since 

power cables are down. 

Ventilation may or may not exist depending upon whether stoppings have blown 

out or overcasts have collapsed. In other words, it is a disaster. 

Now the Job Is To Communicate 

Now let me try to address the issues your questions are raising: 

Let me first address communications in general. Communications is needed in 

BOTH directions not just from the surface to underground. 

There are, at this time and to my knowledge, exactly no commercial products that 

can communicate both directions after the explosion. 

Let me first address the PED equipment. From the information I have, PED, 

presently the most talked about equipment, is only a paging device. It can only page 

from the surface to the devices underground. The devices underground can not communicate to the surface with this equipment. 

Interestingly, PED appears to be somewhat unreliable during normal mine operation. This in itself is not surprising because of the frequencies used by such devices. Modern underground mining equipment using variable frequency drives, generate these very same frequencies in normal operation. This then understandably 

interferes with the paging equipment. In warmer weather, atmospheric noise can 

also interfere. In fact, there have been some complaints from present users that the 

PED devices create interference themselves to already installed mine telephones 

and trolley phones. 

On the other hand during a postdisaster situation, powered equipment will normally be turned off or de-energized. This stops some of the interference and should 

improve the possibility of paging an individual device underground. This it does 

NOT guarantee that the paging system will work in all applications. Ground conductivity, placement of antenna equipment both above and below ground as well as 

nearby steel structures and equipment can greatly affect the ability of this equipment to communicate. 

Can PED be useful to trapped miners and rescuers? Yes. The important thing is 

that the underground miners be given enough information to be able to escape the 

mine on their own. This will require that the outside transmitter personnel have 

16

good and valid information about the conditions in the mine postincident. This is 

certainly not the normal situation. 

Apparently at the Sago mine the crew from section 2 had knowledge about the 

location of fresh air in the escape-way after a certain point in the mine because they 

had just escaped. They were in effect the scouts for information. If this information 

could have been communicated reliably to the miners in-by at section 1, those miners may not have decided to barricade themselves and wait. 

If a mine has an installed mine-wide ventilation monitoring system that is measuring ventilation flows, differential pressures, and gas concentrations in the ventilation system, it is likely that good information can be provided to those miners still 

underground via their individual PEDs. It is very unlikely that a mine will quickly 

send a real person into harm’s way to ‘‘scout’’ the ventilation system and the mine. 

That is the job of the rescue team and takes several hours of precious time to get 

started. Information about the ventilation system, gas concentrations, and what 

parts of the ventilation system are working is an immediate need postexplosion. 

Is bi-directional communications possible? Yes, but, the next question you 

should ask is whether such equipment can be built that can provide bi-directional 

communications between the surface and underground. The answer is yes with qualification. At reasonable depths of a few hundred feet, communications by voice and 

data is very possible and in fact has been in use by cavers for at least 20 years. 

This equipment is designed and built for the most part by radio amateurs for use 

by cavers. This equipment is usable but not presently permissible by MSHA standards, of course, and is not available in commercial quantities at all. For example 

there may exist less than 100 radios in total, constructed during the last 20 years 

by these ham radio operators. Could more be built? Yes of course. Can it be done 

in 1 year or less? Doubtful. This equipment is presently of briefcase size with antennas that are not easily carried (one meter diameter loop.) It may be possible to place 

such equipment in the safety barrel with the self contained self rescuer breathing 

equipment for use only postincident. 

Can commercial communications equipment be built for individual coal miners 

and sold to the mining industry? Yes. In fact, in the longer term, this will probably 

have the best impact. One problem is however that most radio manufacturers are 

not willing to develop and build such equipment for such a small market as mining. 

I am aware of only one company that has begun to develop such equipment. That 

is Kutta Consulting in Phoenix, AZ. Kutta has been developing, under an SBIR for 

the Department of the Army, a radio technique used by cavers and tested in caves. 

They have expanded that technology and have now applied for patents on new developments. An SBIR means that development is fairly slow and not well funded. 

Typically such work involves only a very meager effort by a person during the development. Again the market is relatively small for such equipment for coal mining. 

Kutta believes that they can also market to emergency responders for communications in areas of collapsed buildings and to DOD for the military’s use in caves. 

In my opinion, the immediate best hope for postincident communications 

for the next year or even two is to go ahead with equipment such as PED while 

keeping in mind that this equipment is not ideal and may become outdated quickly. 

The MSHA Web site notes that the company will require 6 to 9 months to produce 

enough equipment for 50 mines. [http://www.msha.gov/Techsupp/

PEDLocatingDevices.asp] This means that once more modern two way communications gear can be developed and tested, that the PED pagers may need to be replaced with more modern bi-directional communications gear. 

Another question that you should consider is how to codify a requirement for 

such communications devices such as PED or others. Requiring a specific manufacturer’s product that is only doing half the job (only communicating one way) may 

be a reasonable quick solution, BUT, one should ask what will happen when better 

equipment becomes available. Will a coal mine operator simply say, ‘‘I already conform to the requirement’’ and wave a PED device at the inspector? If it is chosen 

to write rules, then it is my opinion that the rules must be broad enough to allow 

multiple solutions from multiple manufacturers and not put our miners in a bind 

in a year or so when better actual two way communications equipment becomes 

available. 

Now, let me address tracking of miners. The tracker equipment that is being 

proposed depends upon a large infrastructure of underground equipment and cable 

or fiber and wire. Since the chance of this underground equipment surviving an explosion is very small, the only information that will be available will be that collected before the incident and any that might still be powered and communicating 

out-by the destroyed area. 

The use of through the earth radio gear that can be utilized in both directions 

can be used for tracking as well as communications instead of requiring underVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00020 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
17

ground infrastructure to be installed to do so. The cavers have used this ability for 

many years to map caves from above ground. They can locate a caver rather accurately in three dimensions and tie that to surface GPS coordinates. This presently 

requires real people active with receivers above ground who have an initial idea of 

the general location of the person underground. This past weekend, cavers were 

mapping a cave near Riverton, WV with people outside in the snowstorm locating 

the in ground cavers using such equipment. They were tracking XY to within 1 foot 

with a depth of 300. Is this equipment commercially available? No, as stated above, 

these are essentially radio amateurs building their own equipment. 

Can this equipment be commercialized? Of course. Such equipment will need to 

be developed for commercial use, approved by MSHA, and produced. All of the problems sited above for getting communications equipment into the coal mines exist 

with this equipment as well. 

So What Action Should Be Taken by Congress? 

1. Financial support should be provided to speed up the developments being proposed by Kutta Consulting, West Virginia University, and other entities. I would 

suggest that support be provided to underwrite the expense of producing at least 

the first wave of equipment into the coal mines. I doubt that otherwise, a communications company will choose to develop new equipment, get MSHA approval, and 

produce such a small number of units to support our miners. 

Beyond this immediate goal, there are additional longer term high technology additions to this base radio equipment that are more research and development. These 

will improve and expand the application of these through the earth radio communications systems and make such systems easier to use. These include automatic 

sensors that might automatically determine from the surface, the condition of a 

miner who is underground. Automating the tracking of miners and equipment 

should be done using the through the earth technology. Presently this is manpower 

intensive and can only be used during emergencies. Reliable and automatic communications equipment for data and voice postdisaster must be developed and supported. As time goes on, hybrid equipment can be developed that will combine the 

commercial pre-incident equipment with the rescue postincident equipment to create 

a self healing network of equipment to give the coal miner a better chance at survival. 

2. A review and possible modernization of MSHA tech support’s methodologies of 

evaluating electronics equipment. Modern electronics is extremely low power in general and does not necessarily require the same scrutiny and analysis that tube type 

electronics required for permissibility in years long ago. 

3. Rules changes that require that coal mines have a method of communications 

postincident both to and from the miner. This should allow options as much as possible. Provisions should allow for innovative ways of communicating. If one is going 

to allow a one way pager for example, then one might install a set of geophones 

permanently above ground with computerized readouts at a central location that 

can locate a miner pounding on a rail or rib. One might simply install a bore hole 

with an explosion proof and survivable telephone whose cables can not be blown out 

the bore hole. Allowance should be provided for innovative and reasonable solutions 

to communications to and from underground that can survive incident conditions. 

Thank you for your time.

Senator ISAKSON. Dr. Nutter, thank you. 

Mr. O’Dell. 

Mr. O’DELL. Senator Isakson, Senator Murray and Senator Kennedy, I appreciate you putting this forum together today and having me a part of this. My name is Dennis O’Dell. I am the current 

Administrator for the United Mine Workers of America. I represent 

their health and safety department. 

I was born and raised in Fairmont, West Virginia, educated in 

Fairmont, West Virginia. Prior to me becoming the Administrator, 

I was a field representative in health and safety for 10 years in 

which I covered a large area of the United States, but more importantly than that, the thing that I am very proud of is that I actually worked as an underground coal miner for 20 years. 

And with that, I sit here before you today and tell you that it 

sickens me to see what we are going through, that it takes such 

a tragic accident such as what happened at Sago and Aracoma, and 

18

other instances where we have miners being killed to get to where 

we are. It has always been written, and I can remember as a young 

boy when Farmington No. 9 blew up, what those families went 

through because I was 20 minutes from Farmington, and I was at 

the Sago mine and saw what those families went through. 

I am happy to see the representatives that are here today. It encourages me to see that there are some people out there who are 

willing to push some technology and develop new technology for the 

miners underground. It troubles me, though, to look at some of the 

self-rescuers that you see before you today, and when I started in 

the coal mine in 1977, these are the same self-rescuers that I wore. 

Nothing has changed since then. 

So that is something that we definitely need to look at. The industry has been stagnant as far as pushing technology for new development on safety gear. We have gone a long way on production, 

but we have been stagnant on pushing safety improvements. It 

seems like the industry and the Government has been satisfied 

with status quo because we have had lack of new rules to force the 

technology of new developments. 

Part of the problems are underfunding of NIOSH, underfunding 

of MSHA. They need to have a budget that allocates money toward 

the development of new technologies so that we can have better 

safety protection for our miners today. 

Another problem is there seems to be no communications between government agencies that already may have technology that 

exists. NASA, the Pentagon, there may be technologies that they 

have already worked with that can be applied to the mining industry today and there needs to be an open communication between 

those agencies and the mining industry. 

But to make all this work, there has to be an attitude, there has 

to be proper funding, there has to be an attitude of an industry and 

a government and the agency that oversees the mine health and 

safety that says these things will work. We cannot go into this with 

an attitude that this will not work. We have to take the attitude 

that these things can work and we can push the development of 

making them perfected. 

A price cannot be put on a human life. I found it very troubling 

today to learn that one of the most important people that should 

be at this table today is a representative from NIOSH, and the 

Government did not allow him to be here today, and there is a lot 

of valuable information that could have been put before this team 

of people today that could have been learned upon, and I see I have 

a red light. So I will be open for more discussion later. 

Senator ISAKSON. Mr. Shearer. 

Mr. SHEARER. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, and Senator Murray and our Senator Kennedy. As founder of CSE Corporation, I 

appreciate having the opportunity to appear before you today and 

am pleased to be of assistance to this subcommittee as it explores 

emergency safety equipment for miners in underground mines. 

CSE has from its inception been intentionally focused on this 

very important aspect of workplace safety. CSE began operations 

in the 1970s. Its major focus has always been to provide the most 

effective and conveniently portable self-rescuer for miners that 

19

would meet the 1-hour minimum duration requirements established by law. 

This was in response to a specific mandate of Congress in section 

317 of the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969, reenacted in 

the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977. 

From the outset, the goal was to produce a unit that was not 

merely a filter, like the belt-wearable filter devices in use at the 

time, but rather a unit that would provide a source of oxygen independent of whatever gases might be in the mine’s atmosphere. 

The self-contained self-rescuers used in mines today meet that 

goal by providing a totally self-contained breathing circuit that provides the miner with oxygen that is generated within the unit itself 

and is not dependent in any way on the composition of the mine’s 

atmosphere. 

For many years, our focus and the focus of others has been to 

make the legally mandated self-rescuer as convenient as possible 

and specifically as conveniently wearable as possible. Early units 

were quite large. We had one. We introduced the AU9 in the first 

go-round with the breathing apparatus and that unit weighed 11 

pounds. It was not wearable. You had to store it. 

The presently used SR-100 is a truly portable and belt wearable 

unit. The wearability means that miners have an oxygen supply 

immediately available for an emergency. Another critical part of 

developing self-rescuers has been to make them mine durable. 

They need to stand up to the harsh mine environment where they 

are regularly subject to potential exposure from physical trauma, 

moisture and sometimes significant temperature variances. 

This is the unit that the miners are wearing, our unit, and I 

would be glad to take questions later on about that. CSE has made 

great strides in addressing all of these issues critical to providing 

each miner with a completely reliable self-contained self-rescue device. For some time now, we have been working toward developing 

the next generation of self-rescuers for miners. 

Not only do we plan to make our new unit more compact, we 

hope to include a device that will permit oral communication without interfering with the clean air supply that the unit provides the 

miners. 

Of course, any unit we produce must meet all of the approval 

and certification criteria and testing of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and the Mine Safety and Health Administrations. 

As improvements are made, new standards may be needed for 

approval and certification. We’re saying we think that has to come 

soon. As with all lifesaving devices, training is critical. Frequent 

training can ensure that all mines are completely ready to deploy 

a unit if ever the need should be. 

I cannot emphasize enough how important this is. CSE has been 

pleased to work with the Government, mine operators, and miners 

on training programs for the current SCSR and we look forward to 

continuing these efforts. We spend a lot of time in this area. It is 

so critical. 

I would like to offer a written copy of my statement for the 

record and will be pleased to answer any questions you may have. 

Thank you, sir. 

[Prepared statement of Mr. Shearer follows:]

20

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SAM SHEARER

Good Morning Mr. Chairman and Senator Murray. As founder of CSE Corporation, I appreciate having the opportunity to appear before you today and am pleased 

to be of assistance to this subcommittee as it explores emergency safety equipment 

for miners in underground mines. CSE has from its inception been intensely focused 

on this very important aspect of workplace safety. 

CSE began operations in the 1970’s. Its major focus has always been to provide 

the most effective and conveniently portable self-rescuer for miners that would meet 

1 hour minimum duration requirements established by law. This was in response 

to a specific mandate of Congress in Section 317(n) of the Coal Mine Health and 

Safety Act of 1969, reenacted in the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977. 

SELF-CONTAINED SOURCE OF OXYGEN

From the outset, the goal was to produce a unit the miner could carry at all times 

that was not merely a filter (like the belt wearable filter devices in use at the time), 

but rather a unit that would provide a source of oxygen independent of whatever 

gases might be in the mine’s atmosphere. The self-contained, self-rescuers used in 

mines today meet that goal by providing a totally self-contained breathing circuit 

that provides the miner with oxygen that is generated within the unit itself and is 

not dependent in any way on the composition of the mine’s atmosphere. 

LIGHTWEIGHT, BELT-WEARABLE UNIT

For many years, our focus and the focus of others has been to make the legally 

mandated self-rescuer as convenient as possible, and specifically as conveniently 

wearable as possible. Early units were quite large in comparison to the reduced size 

units we are now able to provide. The early units could not be worn by miners while 

they went about their daily work underground. Those units had to be stored while 

the miners carried small filter-type breathing units on their belt to provide protection until they could reach the stored units. In the event of an emergency, the miners would have to locate the cache of stored units, take off their filter self-rescuer 

and don the self-contained self-rescuer before they could begin their escape from the 

mine. 

The presently used SR-100 is a truly portable unit. It is lightweight and is designed to be carried on the miner’s belt. Thousands of miners carry one everyday 

in the mines. The wearability of this type of self-contained self-rescuer means that 

miners have an oxygen supply immediately available for an emergency. The small 

size of the current SCSR also means that, in addition to the unit worn on the miner’s belt, more units can easily be stored at strategic locations in the mine to provide 

additional oxygen supply capability, should that be needed. 

The portability of the unit also obviously facilitates an easier escape of the mine. 

If the way is clear, miners need to be able to exit the mine on their own, in the 

event of an emergency. If self-rescue is possible, this is far better than waiting in 

the mine for a rescue team to arrive. The belt-worn SCSR provides the capability 

for self-rescue, and also provides a reserve of safe air to breath in the event the 

miner cannot exit on his own. 

If needed during self-rescue, additional SCSR units can be picked up from storage 

caches along the escape route and carried until they may need to be donned. The 

portability of self-rescuers makes it easier to carry additional units while walking 

out of the mine. In the event the miner has to wait for a rescue team to arrive, 

a portable supply of oxygen, as provided by an SCSR, will enable the miner to travel 

to a safe location to await rescue. 

MINE DURABLE

In addition to making them as compact as possible, another critical aspect of developing self-rescuers has been to make them mine durable. They need to stand up 

to the harsh mine environment where they are regularly subject to potential exposure from physical trauma, moisture and sometimes significant temperature 

variances. CSE has made great strides in addressing all of these issues critical to 

providing each miner with a completely reliable self-contained self-rescue device. 

Over the years, we have incorporated new component materials to enhance the 

unit’s durability and we have added to the units indicators that will provide the 

user with important information about the unit’s operating condition. 

TRAINING

As with all life saving devices, training is absolutely critical. Frequent training 

can ensure that every miner is fully ready, without hesitation, to deploy a unit if 

21

ever the need should arise. Training once per year is not enough. Training for miners should be conducted frequently on how to don the SCSR, how to shift from their 

first SCSR to their second unit, if necessary, and how to care for and inspect the 

unit. I cannot emphasize enough how important each of these things is. CSE provides training materials, including training units, to the mines for use in training 

programs. CSE has been pleased to work with the Government, mine operators and 

miners on training programs for the current SCSR and we look forward to continuing those efforts. 

NEXT GENERATION PORTABLE BREATHING UNIT

For some time now, we have been working toward developing the next generation 

of self-rescuers for miners. We are working on developing units that can provide air 

supplies of lengths other than the currently mandated 1-hour. We also are planning 

to make our new units more compact, and we hope to include a device that will permit oral communication without interfering with the clean air supply that a unit 

provides to the miners. 

Of course, any equipment we produce must meet all of the approval and certification criteria and testing of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and 

Health and the Mine Safety and Health Administration. Since we are looking at 

new uses of technology for our next generation of self-rescuers, we anticipate that 

new standards will be needed for the approval and certification of these devices. We 

have been working with the agencies to keep them informed of our development efforts and we are hopeful that the necessary approval and certification will be in 

place for these new types of units. 

I would like to offer a written copy of my statement for the record, including the 

attached information on the SR-100, and will be pleased to answer any questions 

you may have.

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you. And all statements submitted prior 

to and afterwards, we will leave the record open, they will be included for the record. 

Dr. Walker. 

Mr. WALKER. Thank you, sir. I am Dr. Starnes Walker. 

I am the Technical Director and Chief Scientist for the Office of 

Naval Research. As you all know, we were created by statute in 

1946. Our corporate laboratory, the Naval Research Lab, has been 

in existence since 1921. 

Our mission is to take science and technology, and make it real 

for our sailors and our marines. We operate in extreme environments, all the way from the deepest part of the ocean to space. In 

those environments, we have to maintain communications; we have 

to maintain survivability; we have to operate and meet the mission. 

In maturing science and technology, we take basic research, move 

it to applied research to advanced technology development. 

We provide that science and technology element to the fleet and 

the force. In the environment that we operate, which is not dissimilar to what we have to do in mines, our Navy SEALs and other 

operators have to work within this. The good news is that we are 

maturing technologies; we are delivering technologies that have applications in this area. Our enhanced communications in these environments, the things that we are maturing are robotics that we 

provided. Each of these areas will have benefit to this, and so I 

think with those short statements, I will wait to talk a little bit 

more on that. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, Dr. Walker. 

Mr. Zamel. 

Mr. ZAMEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Murray, Senator 

Kennedy. Good morning. My name is Gary Zamel. I am the President of Mine Site Technologies, Incorporated. I am a mining engineer, and I have been in the mining industry for 35 years. I began 

22

as a coal miner at the age of 18 while going to the university, and 

for the last 27 years, I have primarily had my focus on mining 

technology and its developments. 

I appreciate the invitation to appear before the subcommittee, to 

offer assistance and information on underground mine safety communications and underground mine tracking equipment as available today, as well as the new technologies that we are developing 

for the future. 

In particular, there are two systems that have been developed by 

Mine Site Technologies that have been subject to recent attention. 

Both have been designed to improve mine rescue capabilities. They 

are the personal emergency device and the miner tracker tagging 

system. The personal emergency device provides the underground 

miner with a means of receiving a text message from the surface. 

This is accomplished through a powerful low frequency transmitter 

on the surface that sends a text message to miner’s battery packs. 

The digital display on the battery pack can tell the miner that 

help is coming or where a bore hole may have been drilled or how 

miners can best exit the mine, which travelways are clear at a particular time. In other words, any text message can be sent to a 

miner. 

The other device I have been asked to talk about today is our 

tracker tagging system, and this consists of a small unit that the 

miners carry on their person. When he passes by beacons located 

in the mine, this allows persons on the surface to determine what 

area or what zone of the mine the miner has gone into. 

This type of information can be invaluable at the time of a miner’s rescue. It gives rescuers critical information on where miners 

are likely to be located. I estimate that we have over 10,000 miners 

around the world who are wearing our PED communication system 

today, as we speak. 

Mine Site Technologies is also working on research and development which is a continuous process for our company to provide important advantages in these technologies. Our R&D are directed to 

both providing two-way communications and improving proximity 

protection. The key to the success of our technologies is that the 

device be able to function after a catastrophic event at the mine, 

such as an explosion. 

Much of our time and attention is being focused on ensuring optimum performance and reliability in all types of emergency conditions. We stand in support of your requirements and we seek the 

opportunity to work further together. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you very much, Mr. Zamel. In the interest of being a southern gentleman, I am going to recognize Senator 

Murray first for a question, but give her a chance to think about 

that. 

Dr. Nutter made a statement which I think is very instructive 

for us in terms of this information, and that is that our discussions 

really should be about a postincident environment. We learned explosions or tragedies in mines are not scheduled, they are not anticipated, and we wish they would never happen, but this hearing 

is about if and when that does happen, what we have available or 

23

what we need to make available to put those miners in the best 

position possible. 

Second, I would like to acknowledge the presence of Jeffrey 

Kohler, Dr. Jeffrey Kohler, from the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, and appreciate his attendance today. 

Thank you, Dr. Kohler. 

Senator Murray. 

Senator MURRAY. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I really 

appreciate everybody being here today to help us understand what 

is available and what we need to do as a Congress to help provide 

incentives to improve it. 

Mr. O’Dell, you made a statement that the self-rescuers are no 

different today than many years ago when you were in the mines. 

I am seeing a lot of items on the table here. If you could tell me 

what you would expect, what do you think should be there that is 

not there? And maybe some of the other people who are here with 

some of their devices could tell us what they are. That would be 

great. 

Mr. O’DELL. I think the key is that every miner who works underground should be afforded the opportunity or to have access to 

as much oxygen as it takes them to get from the furthest point of 

the mine to the outside, and sometimes that is hard to say just how 

much that would be because a lot of these units are based on physical characteristics of a person. 

This unit may be good for 1 hour for some people. Maybe it 

would be good more than an hour for some, less than an hour for 

others because of their physical characteristics, as well as the units 

that are on the table to the right of me. These self-rescuer units 

and these three are all the same thing we wore when I worked in 

the mine for 20 years, started in 1977. 

I think you have to look at a way—there is currently some folks 

that are working on new developments. They are looking at a 

smaller unit, maybe able to get 2 hours out of each cache, but even 

with that, I think the key is to be able to place those units underground strategically so that if I am in section A and I need to get 

to the outside, and the outside is 4 miles away, that I have enough 

units that I can pick up or carry or get to the outside with if need 

be. 

Senator MURRAY. That is not available today? The technology is 

not available to store oxygen like that underground? 

Mr. O’DELL. You can store these units. You can place them 

throughout the mine in different areas. There are other units that 

you do not see here today that are stored in the mine. There are 

some mining companies that have a storage, an underground storage plan, that are placed. 

Senator MURRAY. Is it not required? Why do we not do that 

today? Why do we not have more oxygen stored underground? 

Mr. O’DELL. Well, because you can either go with a belt-wearable, because the requirement today is just to have a 1-hour supply, a belt-wearable unit, or if a company does not want to provide 

these type of units that miners wear on their belt, they have a 

larger unit, a cache, that they can place strategically throughout 

the mine, that a miner can pick up such as Ocenco or different 

unit. 

24

Senator MURRAY. If any of the people who are here can give me 

some more information, that would be great. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Yes. Wes Kenneweg with Draeger. It is partly 

tied to the regulations. The regulations, as I understand them, require at this point in time that each person underground have one 

self-rescuer available to them, and that has to be within 25 feet. 

If it is more than 25 feet, then they can have them stored and then 

they can use a smaller unit. This is an old filter unit which filters 

carbon monoxide, changes it into carbon dioxide which is less toxic. 

With these units, we need to have oxygen present. If you do not 

have oxygen in the atmosphere, then this does not help you. But 

if you have the unit stored more than 25 feet away, then you can, 

if MSHA approves this plan, you can use this unit, or there is a 

smaller oxygen unit that is also available to get to the stored units. 

But the key is the quantity of stored units would probably be equal 

to the amount of people that are there, so you would have possibly 

1 hour. 

These units are demand responsive in that you can get, if you 

are waiting to be rescued, barricaded, they can last up to 3 hours. 

Senator MURRAY. What is hard for me to understand is that at 

least the visible mining accidents that we all are aware of, it takes, 

it seems like, a day or longer to rescue people, so an hour just 

seems like too short an amount of time. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Unless you are going to get out—the other option is, as you saw in Canada recently, the refuge chambers where 

someone can go to an area and wait there and some of those rescue 

chambers can provide oxygen for up to 24 hours. 

Senator MURRAY. But we do not mandate those in this country? 

Mr. KENNEWEG. No. There are some rules and regulations regarding that, but I think MSHA could probably best discuss that. 

The other option would be to provide more self-rescuers in strategic 

locations underground so that you could get from point A to point 

B to point C. 

Senator MURRAY. Like they do in a submarine. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. And make your way out. 

Senator MURRAY. Dr. Grayson. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Yes, Senator Murray. Concerning expectations, if 

you could visualize just for a moment that in a number of mines, 

I mean a pretty good number of mines, they may be in seams that 

are only 3 feet high. And a 1-hour supply if that is it, you know, 

crawling out, two and a half miles or three miles like at Sago is 

an impossibility. 

So certainly having more oxygen available, and caches is one way 

to do it. Another one, as the gentleman had just mentioned from 

Draeger, is the refuge stations, and I know that there is some debate on that, too, but you can actually get refuge stations or construct them yourself even out of the coal seam, and we mine rock 

above and down below at times for other things. We could actually 

establish refuge areas and have 40 hours of oxygen or more and 

possibly even establish communications straight down to the refuge 

area. And if there is need for medical assistance, we could do that. 

Senator MURRAY. But we do not have that today because? 

Mr. GRAYSON. There is nothing that mandates it and because it 

had not been mandated and historically, especially on the coal site, 

25

because of the nature of the fires, it just was not pursued in the 

past. 

Senator MURRAY. But we do have the technological capability of 

providing that today safely? 

Mr. GRAYSON. Technologically we are capable of providing that 

and we could provide heat resistance and stuff like this after it is 

down below grade or above grade out of the coal seam itself with 

technology like on the space shuttle. 

Senator ISAKSON. On this subject, Mr. O’Dell. You have already 

spoken once on this so——

Mr. O’DELL. But just as a follow-up, you asked if there is anything that mandates the use of chambers underground. Actually 

there is. There is a provision in the Mine Act that says that the 

Secretary may require operators to put in mine chambers and it 

talks about that specifically in the Mine Act. But the key word is 

that the Secretary ‘‘may.’’ It does not say that she will. So there 

is language there that can get this done. 

Senator ISAKSON. Senator Kennedy. 

Senator KENNEDY. Thank you very much, Senator Isakson, for 

having this meeting here and for your strong interest along with 

Senator Murray’s helping to guide our committee, and I think all 

of us should take, at least the miners take a sense of satisfaction. 

I know the chairman is strongly committed to doing what we can 

legislatively, and I think this has been true of other members. Senator Rockefeller and Senator Byrd and many others are strongly 

committed as well. So we want to make sure that we get some action. 

In listening, and this has been enormously useful, very, very 

helpful to me, it seems that there are a number of sort of bottlenecks here. One is a careful review of the regulations to find out 

what enhances safety and what hinders it in terms of the modern 

mine. You talked earlier about the progress that has been made in 

terms of mining and the technology that has been used there. 

Have the rules and regulations really kept pace with that in 

terms of safety and security? I think that that is something we 

ought to sort of think about. 

Second, I think there are a whole range of different technologies. 

I mean we have not had the chance to consider. I am someone that 

spends a good deal of time at the water, and I am always interested in the problems of the communications that they have at sea 

and the difference between going into deep areas of the oceans and 

also deep areas of the earth. 

I am a member of the Armed Services Committee and I remember in Grenada the difficulties that the Navy had in terms of communication between air, sea and submarines, and this was something that has gotten a lot of focus and attention, and they have 

made extraordinary progress. But when I hear that they can keep 

someone at 93 meters for 5 hours with oxygen in the ground, you 

know, they are doing some very, very interesting things in terms 

of these technologies. 

So, Mr. Chairman, how do we find out? And who has the responsibility to really be doing this sort of thing virtually every single 

day to find out where these technologies are and where are our 

companies that are doing it? What companies would do if they get 

26

additional kinds of incentives, and might they be willing to do some 

additional kinds of things as well, and who has long histories in 

terms of this? 

Is that NIOSH? Are we depending on them? Are they really 

doing what needs to be done, but clearly this is something, a review that ought to be ongoing and continuing, whoever is taking 

responsibility in safety and security of mines. 

Third, who is going to pay for it? We find out we are enormously 

interested in what is happening in fire departments over the past 

years and we are just getting the figures. My memory is tht funding for purchasing fire equipment was about $500 million last year. 

We will find out before long and I will put the right figures on in. 

But who is going to pay for this? Is this going to be the miners? 

Is this going to be the mines? Is it going to be the Federal Government? 

I mean or is it going to be some of each? You know if you find 

out that we are going to have some resources that are going to be 

out there where people are going to be incentivized to try to get 

some breakthroughs, I think you are going to find some additional 

kind of action. I think we have got to try and figure out where we 

are going with this. 

I mean are we prepared as a country and a society—I think we 

should be—to make sure that we are going to have safe and secure, 

as safe and secure workplaces, under OSHA, mines, under MSHA, 

as we can, and do we not have some responsibility? Clearly, the 

mine companies have responsibilities on this, and we have got to 

sort of think about who is going to do what here and try to develop 

some policy kind of determination so that those that are out there, 

you people that have been doing these things, you have got to know 

what the name of the game is. 

Are there resources? Where are the resources? How much is 

going to be there? What are going to be the standards? And how 

are those innovations and how is that creativity going to be sort 

of recognized within this? So that we can incentivize all of you. I 

think you are all doing enormously interesting different work on it 

and it is all enormously important. So I thank the chair. 

Could I ask Dr. Walker just a question about what you might be 

able to tell us about, you know, the depths and communication? 

You know obviously submarines, probably a lot of this stuff is classified in terms of what you are doing with the diving submarines 

or how you get ahold of them under the ice caps and things like 

that, but what can you tell us generally about earth and depth? 

Are we talking about two entirely different subject matters or are 

there lessons that we can learn? 

What do you think that from your own experience in terms of 

survivability of people at depths, rescue areas at depths, you know, 

with the submarines? You do a lot in terms of those types of activities. Could you expand just briefly? 

Mr. WALKER. Senator, you are exactly correct when you talked 

about where we have been and where we are today in terms of 

communication. One of the challenges that we have had is to be 

able to provide a seamless set of communication across the water 

and into the depths of the ocean. 

27

The types of communications without going into a great level of 

detail extends all the way from low frequency to storage of information and then burst capability, linking it to satellites, so that if you 

are a SEAL in the water or you have a Virginia Class submarine 

or you have a warship on the surface, that you have that seamless 

communication and situational awareness of what is going on. 

Likewise, at the same time, as you look forward in terms of the 

sailor, marine, and the ability to biometrically determine the 

health of the individual in real time and communicating that along 

the same links, that is another value added. So as you look as an 

operation takes place, you know, one, where each of the assets are, 

all the way from the individual, the diver, the submarine, the warship, as well as being able to provide information on threat as well 

as the operation as it advances. 

All of that is there and, from my perspective, it is not an issue 

of developing new technologies. I believe we have things in place 

today that would apply to a mine capability, as Mr. Zamel described, in terms of a data highway and being able to geo-locate 

correctly where the people are, the health of the miners. I think 

that is all very doable today. And that is certainly where we are 

in terms of the Navy and Marines. 

Senator KENNEDY. Chairman, I am sure my time is up, but I 

think this is an enormously instructive panel, and I think we are 

learning a lot and I hope our staffs are learning a lot, too. This is 

a great opportunity, I think, to make some real difference. 

I would just mention last year, in the Fire Act, they purchased— it was $500 million that was available to firefighters for the purchase of different equipment, and I think we are finding out that 

they—I just know from traveling around my own State, and I have 

seen it in other parts of the country—that they really have moved 

up in terms of very advanced kinds of technology in communication. It is absolutely valuable. 

We lost eight firefighters in Worcester, Massachusetts, going into 

buildings 5 or 6 years ago, and they kept going back in to try and 

find the other firefighters. All of them ended up getting killed. 

And it was rather interesting up in Natick where they do a lot 

of research, you know, in terms of body armor and helmets, and 

one of the things they detected is like medics in the Vietnam War 

were going out, and one of the three that these medics were going 

out under fire to try and save had already died. So to have the information in terms of what the condition of people at depths in 

order to protect those that are quite willing to risk their lives as 

we heard down in West Virginia is something that is very important as well. 

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, Senator Kennedy. Yes, Mr. Shearer. 

Mr. SHEARER. May I make a comment? 

Senator ISAKSON. Yes. 

Mr. SHEARER. In response to Senator Kennedy’s comments on 

seeing a need and how do we do some of these things, I would like 

to give an example of what I think can be done. We had, I mentioned earlier, that we are working on a new apparatus that is 

smaller, lighter, and going to be appreciably longer duration. 

28

We are doing that at our cost. We are doing it then at our time. 

That is one thing that financing can certainly help speed the process. We are doing the best that we can in working forward on it. 

We are working with both NIOSH and MSHA because one of the 

other things, assuming we are successful and come up with this 

product, it is going to take some changes in the regulations, and 

I just feel that now is a nice time to start thinking about those, 

and so if there is funding—certainly we would like funding to be 

able to do these projects—but we are doing it regardless. If you 

think it is important enough, you just proceed and do the best you 

can and that is what we are doing. 

Senator KENNEDY. Could I mention one thing, Mr. Chairman, 

just one final point here? 

Senator ISAKSON. Yes, sir. 

Senator KENNEDY. I would suggest to any of the companies, 

there is a program. It is called the SBIR, Small Business Innovation Research Program, out of the Commerce Department. It gives 

awards to smaller companies, up to two or three people for, you 

know, breakthrough technologies on that, and it is not vast, but it 

is over time, it is several hundred million dollars a year, and I just 

offer that thing. 

And if there are some of those that are working in those areas, 

you know, we might just write over there—it is done through the 

Commerce Department—and say that we hope that there are new 

technologies. We hope that at least they would give some additional 

kind of sympathy to breakthrough technologies, if we could help in 

some of these areas. But I just mention that. A lot of people do not 

know about it. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SHEARER. I appreciate that. But another area that we have 

worked on with this apparatus and in this came on to the market 

in 1990, and over the course of time, and it is out in the field being 

exposed to whatever, things happen. So then what we have done 

is come up with devices that we put on that we can tell when it 

exceeds conditions that are not good for the apparatus. The apparatus will not function as well. It may still function, but not as 

well. 

So we do these things because there is a need, and so, you know, 

a lot, I think is being done, and it just maybe does not get around 

that all of this is occurring. So if we could do something. As I say, 

we went to the Government and said here is what we are doing; 

we think you need to be looking at regulations and, you know, I 

believe they are doing that. 

Senator ISAKSON. Yeah, I think I want to pose a specific Sago 

scenario in just a second and ask Mr. Zamel a question, but with 

regard to all of you who are here with products—Senator Kennedy 

and I talked about this on the plane coming from West Virginia—

we are aware that there are many things that can be a catalyst for 

product development. Sources of money is one. Ability to pay for it 

is two. Government requiring it is three. But sometimes any one 

of those three things without the ability to reasonably do it does 

not matter. 

So we are looking, and appreciate your comment, in ways we 

might be a catalyst to be an incentive to research and development 

29

and expansion for new technologies. In fact, the platform for this 

meeting is for the public to be able to see and for us to be able to 

see what is there and what is being done, but equally what could 

be done if. 

With that scenario, I want to, Senator Kennedy and I, when we 

went to Sago, we learned something very interesting that I really 

have not read that much about in the reporting. And let me just 

share it, and then I am going to ask you the question, Mr. Zamel. 

In the Sago mine, there were two mine teams that went into that 

mine, Team I and Team II. That mine if you could visualize in your 

head was a reverse F. It was a long 2-mile, 10,000 foot mine at a 

depth of about 267 feet at its deepest point, and at the deepest 

point, there was a chamber off to the left at the end, and then a 

second chamber a little bit closer to the front of the mine, which 

formed the letter F, if you look at it backwards. 

The first team got to the last chamber going to the left. The second team got right to the closest chamber. When the explosion 

went off, Team I was close to the chamber and they ended up going 

to the end of that wing and putting a barrier, which ultimately between their 1-hour breathing apparatus and the barrier they were 

able to put up, which I think was either polyethylene or some other 

material, one miner we know lived 10 hours and one miner survived. 

Now, the other team got out, and when they got out, they had 

valuable information. They tried to go further to rescue the miners 

that they knew were ahead of them, and were stopped by the obvious problems of lack of oxygen, carbon monoxide, methane, etc. 

But they then came out with a wealth of information about how 

far you could go, what was going on, etc. Our difficulties were the 

following: we could not communicate with those miners at the end 

of that second chamber to tell them if they could make it so far, 

they could walk out. Had we been able to get that information to 

them, and given they had a 1-hour apparatus, it is possible, timeliness, they could have gotten out. 

Second, if we could have known where they were, it would have 

been immensely helpful. Neither one of those things in the Sago incident were possible, and from a communication standpoint, I have 

not been able to find anything that tells me it would have been 

possible for two-way communication even now. 

I am aware, Mr. Zamel, that I believe you produce two products. 

One is a paging communication that in a postincident environment 

works wirelessly. And second, a tracking product. Given the scenario I just described, which was, I think, accurately, Senator Kennedy, the Sago incident, would you address what your technology 

does? And I am not selling—I want to tell everybody here—I am 

not selling his technology and nobody came here to sell their technology. They came here to save lives. 

So after you talk about that, I would like anybody else, who either on the oxygen side, the location side, or the communication 

side, has a comment to please chime in. 

Mr. ZAMEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Our technology was developed after a similar incident in Australia to what Sago has incurred, and the whole purpose of our design has been to allow us 

to keep our infrastructure out of the mine in the best case scenario 

30

and have our transmission system on the surface. So what we 

ideally aim for is to have no transmission equipment underground, 

no cabling underground. It is all done from the surface. 

The only thing that is carried underground is the receiver and 

the unit that I have here is a fifth generation receiver. So our design has continually advanced and improved to being lighter and 

more functional, and this is now the latest development which has 

been launched in Australia in the hardrock mines over the last 

year, and it has now been finally approved in Australia for use in 

coal mines and will be issued to MSHA in a matter of days for approval for the U.S. industry, and all of our previous approved items 

have been designed to meet the higher standards in the United 

States, so we have no problem with them. 

That would allow a text message to be sent just in the same way 

that a pager on the surface can be carried, and a digital display 

will read out a message. So that first crew of guys coming out of 

the mine, the information that was made available, messages could 

continue to be sent to the individual pagers for those trapped miners. 

So this system does offer a way of being able to communicate to 

personnel underground regardless of where they are located underground. 

Senator ISAKSON. Let me interrupt 1 second. Now, they were at 

a depth of 267 feet and a length of 10,000 feet into the earth, but 

that communication was still possible? 

Mr. ZAMEL. Yes. We have systems working in Australia over 

2,000 feet. So considerably deeper, an order of magnitude deeper. 

The low frequency transmission system that we have designed and 

developed, which has now been proven in 140 mines around the 

world, in a broad range of geology from coal to hardrock copper, 

lead, zinc mines, potash salt, has given us an enormous wealth of 

experience. 

The sort of transmission that we use is, in fact, even lower in frequency than that that is used in the naval industry from my understanding. 

So the opportunity exists to be able to communicate, and in Australia, where I have worked for most of my career, or all of my career, virtually every underground coal miner carries one of these 

devices on his belt. 

Senator MURRAY. How much does it weigh? 

Mr. ZAMEL. It weighs, this unit weighs about .8 of a kilogram so 

just over a pound. It is a third of the weight of the existing lead 

acid batteries. It incorporates lead acid technology which has been 

developed through the mobile phone industry, and our electronics, 

which is that unit there that sits on the top, is a sophisticated receiver that also now incorporates a tracker unit, so we have currently approved, MSHA approved, tracking device, and now we can 

also incorporate it in this same pack. So that——

Senator MURRAY. You can locate the person even if they are unconscious? You can track where they are? 

Mr. ZAMEL. No. What we are capable of doing is identifying 

where men are underground in zones. So they go past a beacon. So 

this is a different technology. The tracker system requires a different means of backbone of telemetry, and it is a cabled system 

31

of beacons, and as the miner goes past that beacon, he will be recorded on the surface. 

So in the event of an emergency, the last known location will be 

recorded on the surface so everybody will be known at the time of 

the incident, and the greater chance would be that not all of the 

beacons are taken out. So it would only be where an explosion, for 

instance, or fire might have occurred. So as they come out of the 

mine, they could be being tracked by the beacons out by the working face. 

Senator ISAKSON. They are wireless, the beacons? 

Mr. ZAMEL. The beacon, from the tag to the beacon is wireless. 

The beacons are hard-wire connected. 

Senator ISAKSON. If the wire was severed by an explosion at a 

depth place, would the other beacons working their way back toward the entrance still function? 

Mr. ZAMEL. Yes, the out by beacons would still function, and I 

think there is a lot that still can be done in building in redundancy 

to be able to separately power in the event of an emergency these 

beacons through a UPS, interruptable power supply type of approach, that will allow power to come on to a beacon for a particular period of time in the event that cable is taken out. 

Senator ISAKSON. I am going to call anybody else. I will get right 

to you in just one second, Mr. Campman. Would this be a true 

statement or an accurate statement? In the Sago scenario, had 

there been beacons, and had they worn the device, we could have 

known the last beacon they passed that was still functioning, which 

would have given you a general location? And although they could 

not have communicated to the surface, you could text page to 

them? 

So if they were in that area at the end of the mine that they 

shielded off and had their 1-hour devices operating, which they 

did—we know that was the case—we probably would have known 

at least generally that they were that far, at least that far in the 

mine, and would have been able to tell them if you can get to point 

X, wherever the other team told them, there is good air? Would 

that be correct? 

Mr. ZAMEL. Yes. 

Senator ISAKSON. We would not know that they got the message, 

but we would know we could send it to them? 

Mr. ZAMEL. That is correct. I mean based on our experience, your 

statement is correct, and the beauty of this system and the way in 

which we have designed it is that reliability is confirmed by its 

day-to-day use, so that period that Dr. Nutter talks about at the 

time of the event, pre that time of the event, this is a system that 

is used day after day after day. So miners get comfortable with the 

fact that they have a means of communication because on a daily 

basis, it is used as a management system. 

So at the time of an event, an emergency, it is known that the 

system is functioning and reliable, and we have always felt that is 

a very fundamental advantage of this type of technology, that it is, 

apart from at the time of the event, by having the transmission 

system outside of the mine, you know the system is still functioning. 

Senator ISAKSON. Mr. Campman. 

32

Mr. CAMPMAN. Yes. If I may, I would like to elaborate a little bit 

more on Mr. Zamel’s description for locating system. The technology for locating based on the type of system described does require an infrastructure in the mine, if I am correct in that. 

Some of the newer technologies, in particular one that we have 

already developed not only for the fire service but for security applications, allows any facility, whether it be a mine or a building, 

to be retrofitted with very low cost, battery powered—I am talking 

very long-life battery powered devices that will power it to 6 

months to a year, that allows personnel to be tracked through 

these tunneling system. 

OK. One thing with our radio telemetry system, we have the 

ability to successfully communicate and signal in mining tunnels. 

From an engineering perspective, I am sure some of our other 

members here as well would agree that radio signaling in tunnel 

environments is very difficult, and there are special things that you 

can do to ensure that your signal propagates out. 

Senator ISAKSON. Is it the line of sight problem? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. Not necessarily. It has do with multipathing and 

signal cancellation. OK. The actual tunnels act as a wave guide if 

you will, and can actually cancel out a signal at any particular 

point in time. 

We have overcome that with our technology and one of the ways 

we have done that is either through—we use a very, not sophisticated, but a very clever frequency hopping method which we use, 

if you can envision a shotgun of frequencies. One frequency makes 

it a certain point and then fades out. Another frequency will pick 

up and ensure that signal gets propagated out. 

The point being though our system, it will allow you to locate 

miners in real time, hundreds at one time as well. We have that 

capability now to do that with a low-cost infrastructure in the 

mine. Keep in mind this is radio so we cannot propagate through 

the earth. However, knowing before a collapse or cave-in incident, 

knowing where those miners are at in real time is very important. 

I think what really should be thought about here is a hybrid 

technology where the through the earth type communications coupled with another matured technology such as ours could really 

pay significant benefit to the miners. Now, keep in mind a lot of 

this technology that we have was developed specifically for the firefighter service as well, so we are very familiar with very rough environments that the miners would see. 

Senator ISAKSON. So is it fair for me—I am going to get to everybody—is it fair for me to say yours is through the earth, yours is 

through the tunnel? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. That is correct. Now, keep in mind, though, with 

our system, any point within a building or a mine where there 

might be a cave-in or a collapse, where that sight, line of sight has 

been eliminated, our system has the intelligence to tell where that 

cave-in or collapse would be, and that takes place through our 

micro-repeater devices that are stationed in the mine. 

And again, these devices would have to be powered, but they also 

have a battery back-up which allows them to operate in the event 

of a disaster incident where power would go down. 

33

Senator ISAKSON. Is the information digital information or voice 

information? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. This is all digital signaling information at this 

time and with our system you have personnel accountability. 

You can tell what people are in the mine, where they are located, 

when they have exited the mine, and if they ever hit their panic 

button, and again this can be—I did not bring it with me, but we 

have a command base unit which displays and monitors up to 

3,000 individuals at one time. This same device, also we have a 

computer platform where you can see on a PC screen where these 

people would be located. 

Senator ISAKSON. And your technology is in use in today’s mines? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. Yes, it is. Not in the mine, it is not, no. It is in 

use in security and fire. 

Senator ISAKSON. OK. Dr. Nutter or who was next? I am sorry. 

Dr. Walker. 

Mr. WALKER. Just a few comments. What I think you are hearing 

here is that you would have the opportunity to have I will call it 

a hybrid system between the two that this secure data highway is 

possible. This is not dissimilar to what we do in the military in 

terms of what is defined as military operations in urban terrain, 

where we have to know what operations, where people are, but also 

you can superimpose on this secure data highway with the advanced signal processing, to know, geo-locate people very precisely, 

but also to imbed biometrical information which lets you know 

something about the health of the people. 

And we are looking at individual sensors for people, for the soldiers, warfighters, that, in fact, are fairly inexpensive, where every 

individual is, in effect, a sensor themselves. So to the future, this 

sort of data highway that is secure, that can withstand extreme environments of explosions and fires, which is what we do as the 

Navy all the time in our ships and our submarines, this is very doable. 

Senator ISAKSON. Who is next? Dr. Grayson. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Actually I think Dr. Nutter was before me. 

Senator ISAKSON. Dr. Nutter. 

Mr. NUTTER. Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. I recognize all the doctors. 

Mr. NUTTER. I hope it is not that bad. 

Senator ISAKSON. Oh, no, not bad at all, very good testimony. 

Mr. NUTTER. I wanted to comment about a couple of things. One 

is your comment, Senator, about Sago, where communications, if 

they had known that there was good air further out, one of the 

things that already exists are computerized mine monitoring systems. Some mines have them and some mines do not. I would say 

probably most mines do not, but some mines do. 

And so that is a pre-incident system with sort of a leftover that 

may exist after an explosion, but if the leftovers are still in existence, they can tell above ground where there is good air and where 

there is bad air. It is monitoring the ventilation system. So they 

can tell air is moving, air is not moving, how fast it is moving, 

whether it is contaminated with CO or methane, live real time. 

That information to a pager makes a great deal of sense. OK. But 

that, as I said, is not a requirement for mining. 

34

Senator ISAKSON. Right. 

Mr. NUTTER. The second thing I want to note is that biodirectional communications, we tend to think of as voice, but after an 

explosion, voice may not be usable. The pressure of the explosion 

may have destroyed eardrums, so being able to communicate by 

just simply throwing a switch or sending a text message, if we can 

do that, I kind of think that may be difficult at that situation, too. 

But a switch or set of switches where they can communicate 

digitally out, I think, is helpful. OK. 

The third thing is tracking. The cavers have been communicating 

with voice above and below ground and tracking for over 20 years. 

That equipment exists. It is not commercial. It is amateurs, amateur radio operators have built this stuff. I am an amateur but I 

do not build cave equipment, but I do know people who do, and 

they can track from outside where their cavers are. 

In fact, they monitor and map their caves. This is a picture taken 

last Saturday outside of Riverton, West Virginia of some cavers 

above ground tracking the cavers underground, and they were 

about 300 feet underground at that point. They monitor the caves 

with this stuff. 

Senator MURRAY. What is that doing above ground? 

Mr. NUTTER. They have an antenna on the ground and they have 

a radio. The cavers underground have a very small transmitter and 

a very large, maybe meter in diameter, loop antenna, which they 

then turn on. These guys can then take angles and plot the position of that transmitter. 

Senator MURRAY. So they know exactly where they are underground? 

Mr. NUTTER. They know within a few meters of where they are, 

yes. 

Senator ISAKSON. Excuse me for interrupting. But is that, that 

slow frequency, is that similar to your technology? 

Mr. ZAMEL. Quite some years ago, we looked at what the cavers 

were doing and we did not see that it had the potential to achieve 

total mine coverage at mines with considerable depth, and when 

we design our technology, 200 meters really does not meet a large 

part of where the market is, so 2,000 meters, as I am saying, is 

more in line. 

So we have to design or we wish to design technology that really 

could meet a much broader sector of the marketplace. I think if I 

could make the comment, we welcome this dialogue and we, as a 

company, are very interested in joint hybrid developments. 

We realize that there is a certain amount of expertise that our 

team holds and others have other levels of skill, and this is too important a subject for us to ignore or disregard the capabilities of 

other organizations including the Navy and private organizations. 

So we welcome this opportunity to work further with your industry 

and with other sectors. 

Senator ISAKSON. Excuse me for interrupting, Dr. Nutter. Go 

ahead. 

Mr. NUTTER. No, that is fine. The only other thing I want to say 

is keep in mind that this is not commercial gear, that this is homebuilt gear. You are looking at probably at least a year of development and this is postincident. This is not very useable in its curVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
35

rent situation as pre-incident. I think it could be with development, 

but as we were talking about, there is money that has to be put 

in those piles in order to get that development done. The market 

is small. There may be 60 to 80 cavers worldwide who do this kind 

of thing. The market in mining is small. So development either 

takes a lot of time or a large effort at once. 

Senator ISAKSON. Dr. Grayson. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Just one elaboration. Mr. Zamel was correct on the 

installations of his experience. With antenna loops specifically on 

the surface, generally speaking, communication to the ground is 

fairly reliable. Unfortunately, in our instance, here in the United 

States, all but one are underground installations of the antenna 

loop which could be compromised because of the explosion as well. 

So I think properly installed, properly maintained, and then it 

would increase the reliability quite a bit. 

Senator ISAKSON. Anybody else? Mr. O’Dell. 

Mr. O’DELL. If I may, I would like to share something with you. 

What I have here is a report. It is an electromagnetic system for 

detecting and locating trapped miners. What is interesting about 

this report, this report was put together by a gentleman named 

James Powell, who worked for Pittsburgh Mining and Safety Research Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 

If I may, I would like to just share this with you. In 1968, when 

the Farmington mine disaster resulted, the National Academy of 

Engineering recommended that a postdisaster location system be 

developed, and the then Bureau of Mines, which no longer exists, 

at the time actually developed an electromagnetic system for detecting and locating trapped miners. It has been in existence since 

1970. 

It is a full report. You will see in here that it has been tested, 

it has been proven to work, it passed—as a matter of fact, I can 

read the summary and conclusions. An EM system has been built 

and tested that permits the detection and location of trapped miners. The hardware required is compact, sturdy, in general practical 

for use in mines. Successful field tests of the system have been conducted at a wide variety of mines. So it is not something that was 

put together haphazardly, but we have had this since the 1970s. 

Senator ISAKSON. Whose technology was that? 

Mr. O’DELL. This was actually the Government, the then Bureau 

of Mines did this. NIOSH, I guess, is the——

Senator ISAKSON. If you are in this business, you would like to 

comment on that? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. If I may, the technology you are referring to, 

which I believe is very similar to Mr. Zamel’s technology, was actually developed in the 1980s and 1990s by Los Alamos Laboratories. 

There is another company who we have recently been in discussion 

with called Vital Alert Communications, and they have a low frequency system very similar to Mr. Zamel’s. However, back in the 

mid-1990s when they had that technology developed, which this is 

a prototype unit of that device, there was no driving means for any 

mines to put this type of equipment in, and that really brings everything full circle. 

Our business started out as a niche business in the firefighter 

protection device market because those devices were mandated by 

36

law that every firefighter must wear a PASS device. Similar legislation going into the mines is not only going to spur development, 

but I think it is certainly going to open the eyes of a lot of private 

industry people to put some resources into that because there is 

enough of a market there, especially for companies our size, to go 

after. 

Senator MURRAY. Mr. Chairman, could I——

Senator ISAKSON. Senator Murray. 

Senator MURRAY. And I know Senator Clinton is here. So——

Senator ISAKSON. By the way, I want to apologize. This end of 

the table has been greatly improved from Senator Kennedy leaving 

in looks and Senator Clinton getting in. 

[Laughter.] 

I am sorry I did not recognize you sooner. So go right ahead. 

Senator CLINTON. No problem. 

Senator MURRAY. You know this is fascinating. And there is so 

much new technology and it just begs the question: why was this 

not in the Sago mine? Why is it not there today? Is it a matter of 

we have to have a regulation to require it? Is that what it is going 

to take? 

And secondarily, the cost of it, how are we going to make that 

happen? Is it because we have not said you have to have this? Because it appears to me that we had plenty of technology out there 

that could have made a difference. 

Mr. CAMPMAN. I think that is part of it. And again, getting back 

to——

Senator ISAKSON. What is the other part? 

Mr. CAMPMAN. Well, the other part is there has to be a big 

enough market there for companies to put their R&D resources in. 

Also, I might add that funding for the product development has to 

be there. If the company can justify it internally because they can 

get enough market share, they are going to do that. 

However, I believe Senator Kennedy mentioned the SBIR program, and other grant programs, if money is made available, I am 

sure it will spur development for these types of products. 

Senator MURRAY. Dr. Walker. 

Mr. WALKER. Just to amplify that, it has been our experience for 

the Office of Naval Research, we find the most creativity is when 

we get a cross-section of academia, small business, and industry together. I mean that is really how we have been able to make advancements in discoveries from the phenomenology, but then make 

things real for our sailors and marines. 

So I think you will find that that is really a very fertile area for 

discovery, but again I do not see any technology challenge that 

would allow this not to improve mine safety, everything you have 

heard today. 

Senator MURRAY. Mr. O’Dell. 

Mr. O’DELL. Yes, in regard to your question about whether it has 

to be regulated to make it happen, I serve on West Virginia—I had 

a diesel committee for the use of underground diesel equipment in 

the mines. And we sat down and we developed regulations that are 

probably the most stringent regulations for the use of underground 

diesel equipment in the world, more so than what the Federal Government requires, more so than any—Pennsylvania may equal 

37

what our regulations were, what we came up with in West Virginia. 

And people kept saying there is no way; you cannot do that. You 

cannot force operators to put these type of filters on these diesel 

equipments; it is too costly; it cannot be done. There is not enough 

interest out there, but guess what? We made a regulation. The regulation was passed, and after that was done, there were people 

that came and now we have the use of that type of equipment with 

the regulations we set forth. 

So, yeah, I think it has to be regulated to force people to come 

to the table to be able to comply with what needs to be done in the 

industry. 

Senator MURRAY. Dr. Grayson, you had a comment? 

Mr. GRAYSON. Yes, just an elaboration. Market share and size is 

certainly part of the answer, but compliance with existing regulations does tend to dominate. I mean that is just a fact of life. You 

will see the larger leading companies who do in mine-wide monitoring systems. They do put in PED systems and things of this nature, leaky feeder systems. But they are truly leading and everyone 

else is behind. 

And I think the last part is that we probably had lulled ourselves 

into a state of—I will not call it euphoria—but at least a state of 

accomplishment over the last 20 years with the record and everyone was seeing the tremendous gains on both the injury side as 

well as the fatality side. And it is not an excuse; it is just that we 

probably were lulled a little bit and did not pursue as hard as we 

needed to make the technology. 

Senator ISAKSON. Senator Clinton. 

Senator CLINTON. Thank you so much. And I thank all of the witnesses for being here, and I especially thank Senators Isakson and 

Murray for holding this, and I really appreciate the very straightforward discussion of these issues. Obviously, I was in another 

hearing and could not get here until just recently, but my staff has 

informed me that it has been a very open and candid discussion. 

It is troubling to me that we have technology and we are not utilizing it as effectively as possible, and I appreciate the nods when 

Senator Murray asked about what is the problem; do we need to 

try to mandate it, regulate it? And my understanding—maybe, Mr. 

Zamel, you could respond to this—is that, you know, Australia’s 

mine safety provisions are more advanced than American safety or 

at least they appear to be, and is that because it is regulated and 

mandated? 

Mr. ZAMEL. It is really, the Australian industry has to be at the 

forefront of coal mining from a productivity and a safety point of 

view because we operate in the export markets and we suffer the 

vagaries of the cycles of the industry. So productivity and safety go 

hand in hand. A safer mine is a more productive mine and vice 

versa. 

We operate under a duty of care responsibility, so mine operators, mine owners, mine equipment suppliers are required to provide technology and operate that technology at a standard that is 

state-of-the-art to meet occupational health and safety needs. 

And I think we have constantly learned from the global industry 

and very much from the United States many aspects of mining, 

38

and we think that Australia is doing some very good work in this 

area, but we do not sit on our laurels. We continue to put effort 

into this, and we also will sit back and investigate the Sago incident and see what we can be learning in that industry. 

Senator CLINTON. I appreciate that because I am troubled that 

in the recent budget, there are no increases for enforcement activities at OSHA or MSHA, not even in coal mining in response to the 

recent disasters. There is not any money for more inspectors to 

oversee mines and other workplaces, to even ensure that the existing regulations are being enforced, and, in fact, as for NIOSH, the 

Bush budget would cut funding to 250 million, which is 36 million 

less than it even requested last year, and this is one of these areas 

where I think it is highly unlikely that new safety technology can 

be implemented in the absence of some Federal drivers, both funding and regulatory. 

And the additional research, the best practices, the kinds of lessons learned that Mr. Zamel is talking about, will not do us any 

good if they say in reports, as Mr. O’Dell pointed out, that are 40 

years old. You know that is not progress. So I would hope that we 

can figure out a way to marry the private sector’s interest in these 

new technologies, the work that is done in the Defense Department, NASA and other places on relevant technologies, and try to 

figure out a more effective response that I am sure is going to include some Federal dollars and regulation. 

Otherwise, I am afraid we will be back here in 5 or 10 years, and 

we will be saying, gee, you know, we have not done it yet, and 

there are lots of reports that are out there. So I am hoping that, 

Mr. Chairman, we can pursue this and see what kind of sensible 

practical solutions we can come up with. 

Senator ISAKSON. I appreciate the comment. Let me inject something. I would really like for any of you experts, because I am not, 

to comment on this. But one thing I want us to all be very aware 

of, I scuba dive. Most of the things developed for scuba diving were 

developed a lot later than back in the 1970s and are still very similar. Now not the 93 meter stuff. I am not into that stuff at all. I 

am a 60 foot and up guy myself but, nonetheless, you have got 

atmospheres and the consumption of oxygen increases dramatically 

at every 33 feet in depth that you go because of the compression. 

The same thing does not happen per se in mines, but there is a 

physiological effect on the human being. There is just so much that 

you can do. 

Second, there is a weight problem. What your miner can carry 

and what, how long it will last, function together. I mean you 

would like to have a miner be able to carry 32 hours of oxygen, but 

the fact of the matter is the 1 hour weight is what—31 pounds; is 

that right? What is the 1-hour weight? 

Mr. KENNEWEG. The self-rescuer? 

Senator ISAKSON. Yeah. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Six to eight pounds. 

Senator ISAKSON. Well, 31 pounds must have been the total 

weight that miners might carry with all their other stuff, but you 

end up being—so we have some limitations, you know, of physiology. 

39

Second, and it has been referred to by Mr. Shearer and by some 

others indirectly, mandating it does not necessarily make, on itself, 

make it happen. You have got to have the ability to realistically 

form the capital to make the investment, to do the research and 

development, to develop the product, as well as it has to be, reasonably be something that can be purchased given the industry that 

you are talking about by what it generates after it is over. 

I do not say that in the least bit to tamper with the idea of requiring anything that will make it more safe. But we have to require that there are some practical issues of human physiology and 

human strength and things like that, and the laws of physics that 

affect some of this stuff. So I just wanted to be sure I threw that 

in there. 

Yes. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Just a follow-up point because it sort of touches 

on what you are discussing. But there is sort of a tradeoff between 

the requirement of certain technologies and how much of it we 

might require and with other technologies that could be used, and, 

for instance, for my background, I came back from a multiple shaft 

mine, and we would——

Senator ISAKSON. Is your mike on? 

Mr. GRAYSON. I think so. 

Senator ISAKSON. Move it a little closer then please. 

Mr. GRAYSON. OK. I came from a multiple shaft mine, so in other 

words, a vertical shaft going down in, rather than a shaft horizontal type that we are seeing in the news. But we had four shafts, 

two of them were equipped with elevators, and the other two had 

escape hoists. So that an SCSR, a single one, that was person 

wearable, all of a sudden became, you know, very practical because 

it would be less than an hour to get to the one shaft, and we did 

not have to go 3 hours or 3 miles in order to get our way out. 

So by having two separate and distinct escapeways that were actually separated physically by some distance of a couple of miles, 

then we enhanced our probability of escape with a 1-hour type 

SCSR. Unfortunately, a lot of our mines do not have that at this 

point in time. I am not suggesting——

Senator ISAKSON. Do not have additional escape shafts? 

Mr. GRAYSON. No, no, they——

Senator MURRAY. Because there is no requirement or? 

Mr. GRAYSON. Well, like the Sago mine. You saw the openings 

came into the mine from an outcrop, and it ran three and a half 

miles in, and they had two separate distinct escapeways, but they 

were just maybe a few hundred feet apart. The minimum requirement of the law was 50. 

But they came to the same spot. So when they were trapped, 

they really had nowhere else to go, neither refuge chamber or an 

escape shaft, which does not have to be a large diameter escape 

shaft. As long as you can get, you know, one or two or even four 

people on an escape capsule at one time up a vertical shaft, it can 

be a smaller diameter one. 

So what I am saying is there are some options here that the operators could use a small diameter shaft with escape hoist or refuge stations in case miners get trapped. Then we also have the 

other option of the SCSRs, placed at a certain distance, but still reVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00043 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
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alizing that if you fill the mine up with SCSRs every 1,500 feet, 

let us say, and you have got three miles to go, the odds on getting 

to the next cache may be blocked, go to the third cache or something like that. So there is a tradeoff on what could be feasible 

choices in order to achieve what we in the end want. 

Senator ISAKSON. I think I—tell me if I am wrong. You just made 

a great point. I think what I hear you saying is depending on the 

type of mine and the mining operation, a one-size-fits-all does not 

work. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Exactly. 

Senator ISAKSON. If I understand, the Canadian mine where they 

had the escape chamber—not the escape chamber—the panic room 

they called it, I think, or the escape chamber, that was a potash 

mine which is a whole lot different than a coal mine. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Uh-huh. 

Senator ISAKSON. And so although when I first heard that, I said 

that is the answer, and then all of a sudden I started asking questions, said, well, it might be the answer in a potash mine, but you 

might do something different in a coal mine. So what you are saying is you might take the approach, there may be a myriad of options from which mines, given their characteristics, type, location, 

depth, etc., might choose from to enhance safety; is that correct? 

Mr. GRAYSON. Yes, sir, that is exactly the point, and as long as 

they have the option, they can pick whichever one seems to be 

make most sense for the particular operation. And then if they 

want to choose refuge chambers, for instance, and do an optimal 

siting of where people are going to be located, and then pick two 

or three locations, not all of which will be compromised in the case 

of a mine fire or an explosion in coal, they still have other places 

to go to. Same thing with the shafts. 

Senator ISAKSON. Very helpful. Senator Murray. 

Senator MURRAY. Mr. O’Dell had something. 

Senator ISAKSON. Mr. O’Dell. 

Mr. O’DELL. I would like to speak today as a coal miner because 

that is what I am. I told you when I spoke earlier on I spent 20 

years underground as a coal miner while I went to school. From a 

coal miner’s perspective, it is really quite simple: give us enough 

oxygen to get from the deepest point to the outside. 

We have units that can be placed in the mines today to make 

that possible. I pointed out a report to you that was developed in 

the 1970s, so we now have the technology to locate trapped miners. 

Chambers, we like the ideas of chambers, but as coal miners, we 

are always taught that is the last resort. I think it is something 

that we should have as a backup in case our escape is blocked, but 

we should first be given the opportunity to try to get out very first 

chance. 

And there are other ways that you can do that, too, and that is 

look at the mining plans that are approved today. I think emphasis 

needs to be put on the intake escapeways being better protected 

than what they are today. A coal miner should never be put in a 

position where he has to face smoke coming out of the mine or he 

has to rely on a cable to hold on to because you cannot see or you 

do not know where you are going. 

41

And this can be done. I mean if you protect and you make the 

isolated intake escapeways better for the miners, you give them the 

oxygen you know they need to get from where they are to the outside—I worked at a mine that I could have picked up, not these 

units, but another unit, there were probably 14 units on the section, and I knew if I had to walk out of the coal mine, I knew I 

could pick up two every 1,500 feet if I needed to. So it is possible 

to do that. 

I would encourage everybody that is here today to move forward 

with the technology that we have, but let us not do like we did, 

you know, sit on a report from 1970 till now. And I really appreciate, you know, everybody putting this together today. I know it 

means a lot to our miners. It means a lot to us. 

Senator ISAKSON. I am going to ask you a tough question, but 

you just said something that really hit home with me, going back 

to the Sago situation, and I met with a bunch of miners. In fact, 

I met with the miners that got out and I met with the families of 

the miners who did not, and I think you said you give me the way 

to get out, that is number one. The chambers and everything else 

are secondary, but first choice always is to get out. 

I learned in that Sago situation, there were a lot of people who 

thought, gosh, if we had had a rescue team there, they could have 

got them out and everyone would have been safe, but the fact of 

the matter is that was not true. They could have gotten out easier 

than a rescue team could have gotten to them because of the carbon monoxide, all the other things in their way, because the miners 

that tried to get to them said that. 

So you are saying that a miner’s first preference is give me the 

way to get myself out rather than having all these redundant systems for somebody to come and get me. Is that right? I mean not 

saying those are not good things. I believe in the rescue teams, and 

I know the mine companies and the miners do too, but the first 

best way is a path out and the oxygen accessibility to get out? 

Mr. O’DELL. Yes. Because if we have that, then we have no need 

for the other stuff. 

Senator ISAKSON. OK. That is an interesting point. 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. That is why we call them self-rescuers. 

Senator ISAKSON. Yes. 

Mr. O’DELL. But it is important to know that the best plans fail 

sometimes, so we have to have those things in place for backups. 

Senator ISAKSON. Redundancy, right. 

Mr. O’DELL. Absolutely. 

Senator ISAKSON. There was a hand going up. Yes, sir. 

Mr. KENNEWEG. Another thing that would help the manufacturers on the respiratory equipment is the approval process at NIOSH 

could be sped up. We developed products and then we have to go 

through this approval process which sometimes impedes the development because it takes so long. 

Senator ISAKSON. You are not accusing government of being slow, 

are you? 

Mr. KENNEWEG. [Laughter.] Senator Kennedy mentioned the Fire 

Act moneys, and there is a special group of respiratory equipment 

being approved for chemical and biological protection, and that approval takes longer. There is a list of products there. So any of 

42

these other products that go in, it tends to slow those down. So 

more resources there. 

Another thing that could be done is to let NIOSH certify third 

party labs to do some of the testing instead of the testing all being 

done by the Government, and that could also speed things up. 

New test equipment, some of the test equipment, at least we feel, 

that NIOSH has is somewhat outdated. We have to do 

presubmittal testing before we submit our products to sort of assure that they are going to get through, and we cannot really duplicate all of the equipment because it is not available anymore. So 

that would be helpful. 

And we should look at some of the regulations in other countries 

such as Australia and South Africa, Canada, see what they are 

doing there. This unit here is a 30-minute unit in Australia and 

South Africa; here we probably get approval for 20 minutes, and 

that has to do with the test standards. So maybe we need to look 

at being more flexible on inhalation temperatures and breathing 

resistance and things like that. 

And the duration of the units underground. The law is tied into 

this 60 minutes. We maybe need to look at, I think Don Mitchell 

who used to be with the Bureau of Mines and MSHA did some 

studies on escapes in different coal seam heights, and he showed, 

I believe the report showed that you do not need 60 minutes all the 

time. Sometimes you can get by with a smaller unit, but at the 

same time, you could also give the impetus to the manufacturers 

to develop longer duration units, maybe 90-minute units or 2 hour 

units. 

Senator ISAKSON. Were you going to say something, Mr. 

Droppleman? 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. I would like to speak specifically to self-rescuers and to the self-rescuer portion of this discussion. 

Senator ISAKSON. Please. 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. The tracking issue is a very complex one, at 

least to implement for mines. I make firefighting breathing apparatus, and we do tracking and telemetry and the problem there is 

significantly different than underground, and all of us will admit 

that. Our communications to a diver is a different issue than dealing with mines or with tunnels or with buildings. 

I am a fairly significant customer of Grace with the PASS unit 

for the firefighting, and we understand the tracking issues. The 

fundamental problem today that the guys that are underground 

today is that we do not supply them sufficient oxygen to make an 

escape, and you recognized that. You saw that at Sago. 

And the current regulations do not differentiate between the performance characteristics of 60-minute approved self-rescuers. You 

have a coal miner sitting over here that told you that he would 

much prefer to get out of the coal mine. I happen to be a coal miner 

from West Virginia as well. And we are not ganging up on you because we are from West Virginia, but the performance standards 

of the 60-minute approved self-rescuers vary significantly. 

I will give you one example. There is a 60-minute approved selfrescuer that has 157 liters of available oxygen. If you think of that 

in terms of the fuel to make an escape, that is 157 liters of fuel. 

There is another 60-minute approved device that has 80 to 100 liVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00046 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
43

ters of available oxygen. You cannot expect one to give you the 

same duration and distance and performance of the other. One is 

twice as much fuel as the other. 

We need to recognize that in our deployment standards and build 

escape strategies around the equipment that we use. We can do 

that today, and a lot of companies do. If you go to a lot of major 

coal companies in this country, they provide a belt-wearable unit, 

a 10-minute device or a filter self-rescuer. They provide a 1-hour 

stored device on the man-trip vehicle. They provide a stored unit 

on the section and they provide additional units in the returns or 

in the primary escape ways to get out, and you have heard that explanation earlier today. 

We could require that in all mines in this country. But what we 

want to do is make sure that we do not eliminate a viable option 

by regulating it away. And the policy of MSHA has been for the 

last 6 or 7 years to encourage a single device for miners underground. They said you can satisfy the regulation if you put a 60-

minute belt-wearable unit on the belt. Here you are, go in the 

mine, good luck. 

And there are other mines that do not recognize that as an acceptable option, so they put additional units on the mine. They 

should be applauded, and they should be encouraged to—all mines 

should be encouraged to do that. And the vehicle is there to do it. 

Senator ISAKSON. Are you saying there are two different products, both certified as 1-hour devices, but one has the capacity of 

double the liters of the other? 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. Yes, yeah. 

Senator ISAKSON. And there is no differentiation? 

Mr. DROPPLEMAN. They are both approved as a 60-minute selfrescuer. They both meet the requirements of 60-minute approval. 

One manufacturer chose to meet the 60-minute requirement in 

the—sorry—one manufacturer chose to meet the very minimum requirements to get his 60-minute approval. 

The other manufacturer chose to build significant margin. 

And I think what we are talking about at Sago, I think what we 

are talking about in a lot of escape scenarios is that duration and 

performance is real significant. If you look at the NIOSH field investigation reports of the last 10 years, you will see the performance of all the devices that are available, and they are significantly 

different. 

We conduct escape trials all the time to establish what is the 

best pattern, what is the strategy for getting a miner to safety, 

preferably to the outside. 

Senator ISAKSON. Senator Murray. 

Senator MURRAY. Yes. Mr. Chairman, I have to leave, but I want 

to thank you so much for this hearing. This has been tremendously 

helpful. I learned a great deal. I know everyone here did, and I 

really want to commend Senator Isakson again for his focus on this 

issue and a commitment to work in a bipartisan way to move us 

forward in this area, and I look forward to working with you. 

Thank you. 

Senator ISAKSON. Thank you, Senator Murray. I would take that 

cue with about 10 minutes before noon to say rather than me asking a question, does anyone here have something to offer that they 

44

came to offer they have not had the chance to offer yet? Or have 

a comment on what has been offered that they would like to say? 

That being the case, let me tell you what my intention as subcommittee chair is to see to it this information obviously gets to the 

full committee. I know Chairman Enzi, who could not be here today 

because we are finally getting some movement on the pension conference committee, and that is his primary responsibility, but he 

has a keen interest. 

He went to the Sago mine and met with the families as did I and 

Senator Rockefeller and Senator Kennedy. This is not a 1-day hearing for the purpose of saying we did it, but hopefully it is the platform for us to make some critical decisions on what is the best 

thing for us to do, both as a catalyst to spur development of those 

things that are out there that we believe are doable, as well as look 

at the standards that we have and the options that we have and 

make the very best recommendations we can to the Congress in the 

interest of the safety of coal miners. 

I would make a side comment too. The coal industry has exploded for lots of reasons lately, but primarily is the tremendous 

demand and the price coal is now bringing. And a couple people 

mentioned, you mentioned physiology, but the average age of the 

American coal miner is not in the 20s and 30s. It is more like the 

40s and 50s. 

In fact, when I met with those coal miners, I am not sure that 

I met with anybody much that was under the age of probably 45. 

And with the president’s remarks on our own energy independence 

and the importance for us in technologies that are related to coal, 

whether it be gassification or clean coal technologies or whatever, 

everything we can do toward safety helps us to attract a new generation of coal miners because you are never going to take the coal 

miner out of coal mining. 

It is just like technology has improved any number of professions, but it has not replaced the human being. It has made him 

more productive or her more productive. I think the same would be 

true in coal mining, and in coal mining, I think safety is one of 

those key components that leads to good productivity. 

So that is our desire here is to find out what is in the best interest of the industry and the miner and, in the end, the United 

States of America. And I thank all of our distinguished panelists 

for coming from as far away as Australia and other points and appreciate your being here. I hope you will submit any additional information that you think we might need or that might help us in 

this. I would encourage you to get it to the committee within 5 

days, and I stand ready to be of assistance to any of you should 

you need it. 

Thank you very much, and we stand adjourned. 

[Additional material folllows.]

45

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

LETTER FROM SAGO MINERS TO THE DOMINION POST

February 3, 2006. 

MORGANTOWN DOMINION POST, 

Dominion Post, 

Morgantown, WV.

DEAR SIR: We are the miners of the Sago Coal Mine in West Virginia that suffered the mine explosion on January 2, 2006. We have experienced all the pain of 

the loss of our brothers, uncles, cousins, and friends. We have watched with disgust 

as you have reported us as poor, dumb, coal miners that had to work in horrible 

conditions because we could not find work anywhere else. Well, let us tell you about 

our mine and the miners who work here. 

We work at this mine because we choose to not because we have to. We are proud 

of our mine and the miners we work with here. These men are well trained and 

operate million dollar pieces of equipment within the confines of the coal mine as 

easily as you do your riding mower on your lawn. We are intelligent, skilled and 

are aware of our surroundings. None of us would ever allow any condition to exist 

that would injure one of our fellow workers on purpose. Every time that any of us 

have become aware of any hazard and reported it to any member of the company 

they have corrected it almost immediately. We feel that we have a safe mine or we 

would not work here. 

The explosion we experienced occurred behind a set of seals in an abandoned 

area. I don’t know of any man alive that could have predicted that such a thing 

would occur. We have a greater interest than any other group of persons in the 

world as to what occurred. We will have a guess but are willing to wait until the 

investigation is complete to know the real answer. 

The current management of this company and our mine has been portrayed by 

the media as uncaring about our personal safety. Nothing could be further from the 

truth. This company has put a safety program in place that literally puts our safety 

in our own hands. They have responded to citations issued and try to correct them 

immediately. They then discuss with us (the employees) the violation and how we 

can prevent it from happening again. This is done to get our input, not as a disciplinary measure. There is even talk of developing a bonus plan that rewards us for 

being safe workers. It appears this plan will reward individuals for attendance and 

safety instead of for production. 

You all seem to indicate that we have a dangerous mine because we received over 

200 citations from MSHA over the past 2 year period. But again, every time that 

MSHA issued a citation we corrected it almost immediately. To tell you the truth 

we did not do some things very well that we should have. MSHA beat us up pretty 

good about clean up, rock dusting, and maintaining the escapeway. They forced us 

to raise our standards. What no one realizes is that ICG’s standards meet or sometimes exceed those of MSHA or the West Virginia Office of Miners Health Safety 

and Training (WVOMHST), and the men at Sago soon began to believe that they 

(ICG) were sincere with regards to our safety. As a result of their (MSHA, 

WVOMHST, and ICG) efforts, we did raise our standards and that saved 17 miners 

lives. You see there was not one survivor of the explosion but 17. 

The ‘‘One Left’’ crew was in direct line of the explosion within 1,000 feet but none 

of them were seriously injured by the blast. Why????? Well, we will tell you why. 

It was because the area of the mine was so well rock dusted and maintained that 

the explosion did not propagate at all. When it ran out of methane it stopped. Our 

17 miners know how close they came to death and thank God, MSHA and 

WVOMHST for their efforts. We also thank the company (ICG) for their corrective 

actions that stopped this explosion. Our miners exited the mine safely in the escape 

way, which had recently been cleaned, roof bolted and screened. 

We also want to thank the mine rescue teams that came to our mine to try to 

rescue our brothers. There were men here from all over the country in a unified effort. A special thanks to the Consol UMWA teams that came to our aid without any 

concern for union or nonunion. They only considered us miners. Those teams and 

individual men will always have a special place in our hearts. We know that they 

took some bad press from some of the family members but we saw their efforts and 

admire them for it. 

We do take offense at the leadership of the UMWA for their statements about our 

mine and the indications of how unsafe we are. Many of us have worked at UMWA 

mines and would like to question why the UMWA leadership made a big deal out 

our 270 citations over a 2-year period. They indicated that if we were UMWA signaVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:38 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00049 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 S:\DOCS\26116.TXT SLABOR3 PsN: DENISE
46

ture mine we would not have had so many. They stated that many of the conditions 

were so serious we should not have been allowed to operate. 

Our question to the UMWA is why does the UMWA signature mine McElroy in 

northern WV receive more than 1,830 citations in the same timeframe and still be 

allowed to operate? Why did Blacksville No. 2 Mine in Morgantown receive 1,400 

citations in the timeframe and still be allowed to operate? Why do Shoemaker, Robinson Run No. 95, and many other UMWA mines receive 500 to 1,000 per year and 

still be allowed to operate? Why, if the UMWA provide such a good safety advantage, do these mines have such horrific violation records? (If you are interested you 

can check these numbers, as they are public record on MSHA’s page on the Internet.) 

We recognize that we owe a debt of gratitude to the UMWA as they helped the 

miner gain a good wage, health benefits and fought for safety. However, we believe 

that the current leadership has an agenda to advance at our expense rather than 

try to help us. They have come to our mine and forced their way in because of this 

agenda. We do not want them to represent us. We have elected our own representatives from within our miners (by a margin of over 90 percent). Why would we want 

a union to represent us whose members receive 10 to 20 times as many violations 

as we receive? We are reducing our citations and will succeed. We have cut the 

number of citations at this mine by almost 50 percent in the past quarter. Their 

history has been the same for many years, maybe after they demonstrate that they 

do have safe mines we would be interested. We will welcome any advancement in 

technology that will help our miners communicate, be located, or extend their supply of oxygen. But those are all devices we never want to have to rely on. We first 

want to know what happened, where we failed (if we did), and what can be done 

to prevent any such thing from ever happening again. 

We would also ask the UMWA and it’s leadership team about it’s contribution to 

the Sago Fund. As it now seems, ICG started the fund with a 2 million dollar donation. Lots of companies and individuals have generously contributed to the fund as 

well, particularly a $250,000.00 donation from A.T. Massey. To date, we have seen 

no mention of the UMWA’s donation. If they have that much care and concern for 

us, show it to these families. 

We just want to set the record straight. We are intelligent, skilled men that are 

working here because we want too. We have a brotherhood here that is close and 

will become closer when we are allowed to return to work. We will take this experience and learn from it and will never allow it to occur again. We all understand 

the risk we are exposed to but also know that the mine is as safe as we make it.

THE MINERS OF SAGO,

CRAIG NEWSOME, 

Buckhannon, 

JEREMY TOLER, 

Canvas, 

CHESTER RUNYON, 

French Creek, 

BRIAN E. CURTIS, 

Buckhannon. 

3M WHITE PAPER

3M CARBON MONOXIDE OXIDATION CATALYST

The topic of this paper is an oxidation catalyst for carbon monoxide that is also 

an adsorbent for organic vapors. Its potential applications might include significant 

advances for carbon monoxide filtration for miners and chem-bio/smoke escape 

hoods. 

The current oxidation catalysts for carbon monoxide that are available fall into 

three categories.

• Hopcalite (mixed oxide of Cu and Mn) 

-good catalyst for CO oxidation but deactivated by water vapor 

• Pt/Pd on SnO2/metal oxide 

-tolerates H2O but high Pt/Pd loadings needed to be effective at high CO levels 

• Nanoparticle gold on oxide support 

-very active at high RH 

-expensive due to high consumption of gold

47

While these CO catalysts are effective, they each have material drawbacks. 

Hopcalite is an effective catalyst, but it is deactivated by water. Therefore a desiccant bed up-stream of the catalyst is required. The useful life of such a system 

is determined by the capacity of the desiccant bed. The Pt/Pd catalysts require high 

precious metal loadings but these are very expensive materials to be used in high 

loadings. Current technologies for making gold nanoparticle catalysts are difficult 

to scale up for commercial applications due to their poor reproducibility. In addition, 

it is difficult to reclaim the unused gold from these solution-based processes. 

Recent 3M Developments 

3M has developed an innovative gold nanoparticle catalyst that overcomes these 

issues with available CO catalysts. This new catalyst works well in high humidity, 

is extremely effective at catalyzing the oxidation of carbon monoxide, is cost effective 

to produce, is readily scaled up and is also an activated carbon adsorbent. The 3M 

technology effectively uses all of the gold that is consumed in the process. This 

greatly reduces the cost of the catalyst compared to existing catalysts. 

The intended application for this catalyst is for respirators or collective protection 

filters where carbon monoxide is a potential concern. 3M OH&ESD is currently having discussions with NIOSH and MSHA on the potential application of this technology into mining escape respirators. We are also currently in discussions with the 

US Military labs for the evaluation of this technology. 

Summary of 3M Catalyst Advantages Over Currently Fielded Systems 

• Effective at high humidity—no desiccant required • Higher activity than Pt/Pd/SnO2 catalysts 

-Lower precious metal loading 

-More efficient use of precious metal 

-Lower cost • Readily scaled-up 

-Necessary equipment resides in 3M manufacturing facilities • Excellent reproducibility • Capable of dual function (adsorbent and catalyst)

For more information contact Bob Holler @ 651–736–7865, reholler@mmm.com.

INNERSPACE SYSTEMS CORPORATION

PROPOSAL FOR EXTREME DURATION SELF-RESCUE MINER BREATHING APPARATUS

EXTREME DURATION SELF-RESCUE MINER BREATHING APPARATUS

In response to the Sago Mine accident in West Virginia on January 2, 2006, 

InnerSpace Systems Corporation of Centralia WA. (ISC) would like to submit the 

following proposal in an effort to fulfill Miner safety and need for a Category of 

lightweight, extreme long duration Closed Circuit rebreathing apparatus for a 

meaningful miner self rescue capability. 

1.0 Introduction 

Company Background 

InnerSpace Systems Corp. is a United States based small business known 

internationally as a top competitor in the manufacturing and development of highly 

innovative customized closed circuit rebreathing systems to support the exploration 

of deep/overhead sub sea environments, by direct manned intervention. ISC’s manufacturing and engineering headquarters is located in Centralia, Washington. In the 

County of Lewis (HUB Zone). As a small company of dedicated experienced engineering and support personnel, focused solely on continuing product improvement, 

new product development, and customer service, ISC is able to conduct rapid engineering and prototyping that can be quickly turned into a final product. ISC is 

owned by two US military disabled veterans and is an ISO 9001:2000 registered 

company. 

1.1 Intended Use 

The closed circuit Miner Breathing Apparatus (MBA) is designed to support mining operations in environments considered too diverse for current breathing systems. The MBA may be deployed in miner self rescue operations and miner rescuer 

operations that are considered outside the capability of current systems. The MBA 

diversity is due to a modular engineering approach. The MBA may be fitted with 

components to increase miner breathing duration or tie into other sources of breathing gases to include being tailored to mission specific requirements such as operating in water. 

48

The MBA may be fitted with components that support working in environments 

of extreme enclosed spaces, and areas that expose the miner and rescuer to toxic 

gases, explosive atmospheres, oxygen deficiency and smoke inhalation. This capability provides the miner a greater operational zone of safety. 

1.2 Unit Description 

The ISC MBA is a lung demand driven closed circuit breathing apparatus (BA) 

that uses oxygen as its primary life support gas. The MBA has been designed for 

intensive use in hostile environments yet it is simple in design and construction, 

robustly built and provides high performance with ease of maintenance. 

The MBA is worn as a vest assembly that is easy to don and doff in enclosed and 

limited visibility environments. The harness assembly allows for ancillary gear that 

supports and facilitates self rescue and rescue of fellow miners. First aid kit, water, 

and communications equipment for each miner is provided. The harness assembly 

will also have reflective capability for light exposure and to include chemical lights, 

and white light capability. MBA may also be equipped with an activated miner locating system. 

The MBA is compact and low in profile minimizing entanglements and snags 

through enclosed spaces. The miner may even be dragged by another miner to safety 

with the harness assembly on. The breathing loop assembly has two over the shoulder counterlungs optimizing breathing performance and indicating the miner is 

breathing and easy ambidextrous capability for ease of reach of any of the control 

systems. This also includes the ability of a fellow miner to add life saving gas and 

insure the unconscious miner is breathing. 

The Carbon Dioxide scrubber absorbent system and oxygen cylinder are mounted 

on the harness assembly. The oxygen cylinder and the CO2 scrubber canister are 

covered by a padded cover adding to aesthetics of the UBA or may be fitted with 

a hard cover for added protection. The MBA is constructed of black anodized aluminum, and space age state of the art high impact plastics. 

The breathing cycle is explained as follows; the Miner exhales into the mouth 

breathing valve (MBV) that contains the one-way check valve system. The MBV is 

connected to two flexible breathing hoses, the other ends of which are connected to 

the counterlungs and CO2 scrubber assembly. The Miner’s exhalation breath is circulated into the exhaust side counter lung, through an assortment of water traps, 

then into the CO2 scrubber canister assembly. All of the exhaled CO2 rich breathing 

media is absorbed by a bed of carbon dioxide absorbent. The freshly scrubbed gas 

continues on through the inhalation counterlung and into the mouth breathing 

valve. 

The oxygen consumed by the Miner is replenished by a lung demand valve activated by the result of the reduction of the volume of the oxygen circulating within 

the closed breathing loop, thus oxygen consumption is dependent on the metabolic 

demands of the Miner. The MBA is fitted with a cylinder pressure gauge to monitor 

the oxygen pressure. 

1.3 Design Parameters 

The modular approach design of the MBA gives the user options. The options may 

be utilized for the mission specific requirements dictated to the Miner or rescuer. 

The MBA may be configured with a variety of scrubber systems, oxygen cylinder 

sizes, and may also be configured to do fire fighting roles if the operational needs 

are deemed necessary or probable. 

1.4 Duration 

The duration of the MBA can be up to, but not limited to, 6 hours or longer, depending on the level of effort the miner is doing that may consist of high heart rate 

from work required for escape, such as walking up inclines, crawling, climbing a 

ladder, or helping another miner buried in wreckage. Duration is increased by adding more oxygen from a supplementary outside source or a replacement oxygen cylinder, and installing another carbon dioxide absorbent canister if necessary. 

1.5 Weight 

Weight of the MBA is contingent on the mission criteria dictating duration from 

environmental considerations. The unplanned contingencies, distance to travel, or 

miners needing medical aid and requiring physical help for extraction from the mine 

or the hazardous environment will require increased duration, thus requires the option of a greater CO2 scrubber size and oxygen supply. The estimated weight for 

such an extended range system may be 35 lbs or more. The MBA may be set up 

for non extended range duration of 120 minutes and weight may be lighter than 

251bs and, of course, be capable in the field of adding an extended range package 

or changing out oxygen cylinders and CO2 scrubbers systems under duress in an 

49

enclosed space. Size and compactness is another consideration as rescuers should be 

able to take additional systems down into the mine for entrapped miners. Current 

technology being used does not allow for compactness unless it lasts only 60 minutes 

and weighs 6 lbs which has proven to be inadequate for miner survivability, current 

systems to date with the exception of this proposed MBA is too large and still has 

a limited duration. The larger breathing systems are not issued to the working 

miner but only to rescue crews providing them with a limited breathing supply that 

cannot be shared, or extra sets carried for entrapped miners. 

1.6 Maintenance 

The MBA is simple in design, built on state-of-the-art innovative construction 

without the unnecessary engineering and complexity based on out of date technology 

of other current technology. Currently, other systems require special tools, parts and 

excessive maintenance to maintain the aging or out of date technology that induces 

high cost to the end user. The MBA is designed to use off the shelf components 

when possible and utilize the best in design principles to minimize excessive component parts thus reducing overall operational expenses. 

The MBA requires only the common tools and work environment that a modern 

scuba diving shop facility has and no more. The MBA may be field repaired easily 

if necessary, with minimal tools that the Miner may have on hand. 

Scheduled maintenance of the MBA is considerably less than the current systems. 

The MBA requires minimal time to replace or repair unit components giving the repair technician and Miner less over all man hours dedicated to the service of the 

MBA thus allocating more time for training or other operational commitments. 

1.7 Prototyping and Cost Estimate 

Several prototype versions are being constructed including a unit employing a 

water tolerant/fire fighting MBA configuration for multi-mission use and marketing 

purposes. Other markets that will be explored are the civilian and commercial markets. 

Based on our current knowledge, we can produce prototype units suitable for testing by July/August 2006. These units will include the necessary components, and 

options. It is estimated that final production units could be available by December 

2006 with aggressive testing, pending that the MBA fits into the mining community’s needs. 

Final production cost of the MBA will be pending after the formal testing and recommendations from the testing authority. Every effort will be made to minimize 

cost to the customer and meet customer expectation. 

InnerSpace Systems Corp. will conduct the necessary training for end users and 

a consolidated trainer training camp. All MBA’s will have the necessary operator’s 

manual for the final production unit in a water proof format. 

Summary 

InnerSpace Systems Corp. looks forward to working with the authorities involved 

in developing a useful and cost effective system for the Miner MBA program. All 

questions concerning this endeavor should be addressed to Leon Scamahorn CEO 

Innerspace Systems Corp.

RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE

SAFETY BY WES KENNEWEG, DRAEGER SAFETY, INC. 

Question 1. What devices currently on the market provide the best chance for 

miners to escape in the event of an underground emergency? 

Answer 1. Oxygen Self-Rescuers provide the best chance of escape. The combined 

technology of a small belt-worn oxygen device in combination with larger stored devices located in strategic locations in the mine would enhance escape and rescue.

Question 2. What are the current technical capabilities of oxygen supply devices 

in use in underground coal mines today, and what new developments are on the immediate horizon? 

Answer 2. There are 2 types of oxygen sources that can be used for oxygen selfrescuers. One is Compressed Oxygen, which requires a scrubber chemical to remove 

exhaled CO2 (Carbon Dioxide). The other is Chemical Oxygen, which makes use of 

one or more chemical oxygen sources. The primary chemical oxygen source is KO2

(Potassium Super oxide), which reacts chemically with moisture and CO2 in the exhaled air of the user to absorb the CO2 and generate oxygen. 

Another source of chemical oxygen is Sodium Chlorate which is used on some passenger aircrafts to generate oxygen. This is generally used as a ‘‘starter’’ in the SelfRescuer lasting for only several minutes after which time the primary chemical, 

50

KO2, performs the O2 generating function. KO2 also has the unique feature of being 

demand responsive, which means it will provide automatically more or less oxygen 

to the user depending on his or her breathing rate. Thus Oxygen Self-Rescuers, with 

NIOSH/MSHA approval for 60 minutes, can last 3 hours if the person is in a rest 

position, waiting for rescue. 

In Australia (New South Wales and Queensland), they make use of Quick-Fill 

Stations underground. These are banks of compressed air cylinders stored in a 

metal box at strategic locations underground. At each station are 60-minute SCBA’s 

(Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus) that the miners can don to make their escape 

or wait for rescue. The cylinder banks allow the miners to quickly refill the cylinders on their breathing apparatus without doffing the breathing apparatus as they 

make their escape. The stations are located every 500 meters or 1,000 meters. Air 

is considered by some to be more stable than oxygen in event of a fire or explosion.

Question 3. Is the MSHA approval process helpful or hurtful in ensuring that 

miners have the latest oxygen supply technology? 

Answer 3. The NIOSH/MSHA approval process follows the current regulations in 

effect, 42 CFR for testing procedures and 30 CFR for underground requirements. 

This requires that every coal miner be supplied or have readily available within 25 

feet, a 60-minute SCSR (Self-Contained Self Rescuer). The aim has always been to 

make the devices as small as possible so they are belt-wearable. Prior to the oxygen 

SCSR regulations, the miners were required to wear a Filter Self-Rescuer (FSR) 

which filters CO (Carbon Monoxide). CO is very toxic and present after fires and 

explosions. With this device, one must have oxygen present, ≥ 17 percent normally, 

although U.S. law states 19.5 percent. These FSR’s are still used in the U.S. metal 

and non-metal mines and can be used in Coal Mines to get to the stored oxygen 

Self-Rescuers if the units are more than 25 feet away. Special dispensation must 

be granted by MSHA to permit this option. 

To improve the approval process, several things could be done:

(1) Testing House: NIOSH/MSHA could certify third party labs to conduct the approval testing. At present approval times for certain respiratory protection products 

can run up to 1 year. This is in part due to the Homeland Security approval testing 

for CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear) protection. Longer approval times discourage new developments in some instances. 

(2) Test Standards: NIOSH/MSHA could look at changing or harmonizing some 

of the test standards to match those of other countries, such as the European standards. This could, in some cases, allow smaller and lighter self-rescuers to be approved. 

(3) Test Equipment: Some of the test equipment at NIOSH/MSHA could be updated. One example is the breathing machines used to simulate human breathing. 

In order for the manufacturers to develop products that will meet the test standards, we must do pre-submittal testing. In some cases, this cannot be done precisely 

as the test equipment being used by NIOSH cannot be duplicated. 

(4) Less than 60-minutes: If the regulations could be changed to allow a ‘‘primary’’ 

device that can be approved for 30-minutes, it would give the manufacturers opportunities to put more development time into smaller, lighter devices that could be 

easily worn by each miner. At present only 60-minute devices are permitted to meet 

the current standard. Studies were done in the past which demonstrated that 60-

minute devices are not necessary for all coal mines. Shorter duration devices could 

also provide the needed protection in certain mines.

Question 4. How can Congress be a catalyst for new innovation in this area? 

Answer 4. Congress could provide funding to the Federal test labs for human resources and modern test equipment. Other funding could be directed to Research 

and Development projects at MSHA in conjunction with the manufacturers.

Question 5. If you could design the idea postunderground emergency oxygen supply device, what would be some of the things you would consider? 

Answer 5. Prime considerations are the weight and size. At present, KO2 is manufactured in only a few countries. More research could be done to optimize the oxygen 

efficiency and breathing comfort of KO2. If one wants to incorporate communications 

into the oxygen device, one would have to consider going away from the bite-type 

mouthpiece with nose clip as this prevents talking which could allow toxic gases to 

enter the breathing system. An alternate method would be a collapsible full face 

mask that could be incorporated into the SCSR.

Question 6. Realizing that perfection is always a challenging goal, can immediate 

technological improvements be made to the devices that supply oxygen to miners to 

improve their chances for survival in an accident? 

51

Answer 6. The devices can be made smaller and lighter if the testing regulations 

are changed. Larger devices, greater than 60 minutes, could also be developed for 

storage in strategic locations; but there must be some impetus for the manufacturers to invest R&D dollars into such products. Part of the issue is that while the 

product is important, the total quantity in use and sold each year is small compared 

to other products sold in mining and other industries.

[Whereupon, at 11:53 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

Æ