A group of coal miners in Eastern Kentucky who had blocked a coal train in protest of unpaid wages has ended its protest and cleared the tracks.
A half-dozen miners employed by Quest Energy near Pikeville, Kentucky, ended their protest against the company Wednesday evening after the company paid the miners in-full for work they’d completed over the past several weeks. The miners claimed the company had not paid them for up to three weeks-worth of work. On Monday, in protest of the non-payment, they stood in the path of a Newport News Pier Nine-bound CSX coal train which was preparing to depart from the Quest Energy mine on CSX’s Coal Run Subdivision, off the Big Sandy Subdivision, near Pikeville, at which they were employed.
The miners said throughout the protest that once they were paid in-full, they would clear the tracks. They did so Wednesday when their payments came through.
“We said all along that all we wanted was our money, and once we got that, they could have their train,” said one of the miners who spoke on a condition his name not be published.
The protest was similar to that of coal miners who blocked a train from leaving a Blackjewel Mining complex in Harlan County last summer. Like the Blackjewel protest, the Quest miners allowed CSX to retrieve its locomotives off the train. The Quest miners said local CSX employees were supportive of their efforts, and the railroad made no efforts throughout the protest to attempt to force the miners to leave its tracks.
Quest parent company American Resources Corporation acknowledged that issues had resulted in miners’ paychecks being delayed. An official with the company apologized and said the protesting miners would not lose their jobs over taking action to block the train.
The conclusion of the protest on Wednesday followed a tense confrontation between the protesting miners and some of their co-workers. Wednesday morning, about 40 Quest employees and managers walked to the protest site and confronted their demonstrating co-workers in an attempt to convince them to leave the area and release the train. Kentucky State Police responded and broke up the confrontation, which never escalated to violence. CSX Railroad Police was also at the scene.
The train the miners blocked consisted of 120 hoppers of metallurgical coal, which is used in the production of steel. The miners said 100 cars on the train was loaded with Quest-produced coal, while 20 cars were loaded with coal produced at a mining operation not affiliated with Quest Energy or American Resources Corporation.
A half-dozen miners employed by Quest Energy near Pikeville, Kentucky, ended their protest against the company Wednesday evening after the company paid the miners in-full for work they’d completed over the past several weeks. The miners claimed the company had not paid them for up to three weeks-worth of work. On Monday, in protest of the non-payment, they stood in the path of a Newport News Pier Nine-bound CSX coal train which was preparing to depart from the Quest Energy mine on CSX’s Coal Run Subdivision, off the Big Sandy Subdivision, near Pikeville, at which they were employed.
The miners said throughout the protest that once they were paid in-full, they would clear the tracks. They did so Wednesday when their payments came through.
“We said all along that all we wanted was our money, and once we got that, they could have their train,” said one of the miners who spoke on a condition his name not be published.
The protest was similar to that of coal miners who blocked a train from leaving a Blackjewel Mining complex in Harlan County last summer. Like the Blackjewel protest, the Quest miners allowed CSX to retrieve its locomotives off the train. The Quest miners said local CSX employees were supportive of their efforts, and the railroad made no efforts throughout the protest to attempt to force the miners to leave its tracks.
Quest parent company American Resources Corporation acknowledged that issues had resulted in miners’ paychecks being delayed. An official with the company apologized and said the protesting miners would not lose their jobs over taking action to block the train.
The conclusion of the protest on Wednesday followed a tense confrontation between the protesting miners and some of their co-workers. Wednesday morning, about 40 Quest employees and managers walked to the protest site and confronted their demonstrating co-workers in an attempt to convince them to leave the area and release the train. Kentucky State Police responded and broke up the confrontation, which never escalated to violence. CSX Railroad Police was also at the scene.
The train the miners blocked consisted of 120 hoppers of metallurgical coal, which is used in the production of steel. The miners said 100 cars on the train was loaded with Quest-produced coal, while 20 cars were loaded with coal produced at a mining operation not affiliated with Quest Energy or American Resources Corporation.
Mister Keiser:
Yes. See below.
Oilprice.com folks. NG prices are below 2 bucks. There is more NG out there then they know what to do with…i.e. the low low price. That’s for the foreseeable future too. Oilprice is a great website for tracking prices.
And good job MINERS! Oh and was trump there standing with you WINNING No, didn’t think so. Remember that. He would have been golfing with the mine owners at Mar a Blogo.
Mister McFarlane:
The law – and this is the law, we all must respect the law – says that wages due must be paid on schedule. No and, ifs, or buts. If you fail to pay an employee on time, he objects and takes action, and then you fire him, that is a retaliatory firing and is actionable.
Workers have bills too. Their creditors are expecting to be paid on time and can get downright mean if they aren’t. They will not listen to the worker who says “I earned the money but my employer won’t pay me.”.
My sympathies are with the miners. Although, I point out they are in a dying profession and should seek other employment. But that is a topic for another arena and another time.
The above comments are generic in nature and do not form the basis for an attorney/client relationship. They do not constitute legal advice. I am not your attorney. Don’t mourn, organize.
Does not the FLSA come into play as far as employees getting paid? Anna?
Congrats to the workers for taking a stand. “Issues” that prevented the miners from being paid?? Couldnt come up with anything better than that?
“…yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one, for the Union makes us strong.”
Solidarity forever.
Coal is an energy savings account. If we don’t mine it, it will still be there for thousands of years. Unfortunately we have several hundred year supply of NG now, so it may be that long before coal gets into demand. By then where the rails are won’t matter.
Someday a new technology will appear that will make coal valuable again. We will extract the carbon in a different fashion or use in a non-energy way that will re-drive demand.
No one thought oil exploration would come back to the US in any serious volumes again, now after some 40-50 years, we are the #1 producer. We innovated and we were rewarded.
It will probably take that long for coal to become relevant again.
Russell Hoyle,
You, me and those striking miners and their children will be dead before NG prices rise, that’s how much NG is out there….
I’d fire them if it was my business…you get paid when you get paid, unlike the other incident, ARC did not say the miners wouldn’t be paid, they just said it was delayed.
John,what happens when NG prices go back up way up when the coal mines stop and the tracks pulled up guess we are all up the creek.
Bloomberg reports that natural gas prices have hit all time lows ($2 per/MMbtu) and is continuing to displace coal in the energy sector globally.
In fact the oversupply in NG is so bad, 2 large US energy firms are considering bankruptcy or reorganization due to the massive glut. They keep producing because they need the cash flow.
As long as NG stays cheap, the only future for coal is metallurgical.
Illinois coal gets a huge tax break to keep the high sulfur plants going that can’t convert. Otherwise they would be dead too.
They have taken untold millions
That they never toiled to earn
But without our brain and muscle
Not a single wheel can turn
Solidarity Forever! Great song Anna.