Andrew Little, Minister for Pike River re-entry, has repeated false statements that it is too dangerous to re-enter the mine workings to discover the precise cause of the 2010 explosion that killed 29 workers.
Former deputy PM says New Zealand government is covering up mine disaster
The Labour Party-led government’s Pike River Recovery Agency (PRRA) is continuing work on sealing the Pike River coal mine where 29 people were killed in the November 2010 disaster. The aim is to prevent the examination of crucial evidence about what sparked a series of explosions.
For more than a decade the political establishment has protected those responsible for the disaster, including former managers, chief executives and directors of Pike River Coal. A 2012 royal commission of inquiry established that the company endangered its workers’ lives in order to save money. The mine had grossly inadequate ventilation and methane gas monitoring, an extremely dangerous underground fan, and no emergency exit as required by law. No one has ever been held accountable for turning the mine into a death trap.
UK mines rescue expert: Sealing Pike River mine “morally and professionally indefensible”
23 July 2021
The
World Socialist Web Site is reprinting, with permission, a letter sent by UK mines rescue expert Brian Robinson earlier this month to Pike River Recovery Agency (PRRA) chief executive Dave Gawn, opposing the decision to seal Pike River mine and abandon the underground investigation into the causes of the 2010 disaster that killed 29 people. The government is currently installing the first of two seals, and intends to put in a second, permanent concrete barrier as quickly as possible, regardless of legal challenges by family members of the victims.
Families picket road to prevent the sealing of New Zealand’s Pike River mine
This morning, family members of some of the 29 workers killed in the Pike River mine disaster, as well as their supporters, held a protest blocking the road to the mine site on the West Coast of New Zealand’s South Island.
Families and supporters picket on the road to Pike River mine (Photo by Kath Monk)
The action is part of the fight by 22 of the 29 families to stop the Labour Party-Greens government from permanently sealing the mine and preventing the forensic examination of evidence about what caused the November 2010 explosions.