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Deepwater Horizon victims join W. Va mine victims in exposing worker safety

President Obama delivered a eulogy Sunday for the 29 workers who died in the April 5 West Virginia mine disaster. The President remarked that letters have flooded the White House from the victims’ families and friends imploring him to find the silver lining in the Upper Big Branch mine tragedy.

"They make a simple plea: don't let this happen again," Obama said.

"We cannot bring back the 29 men we lost. They are with the Lord now. Our task, here on Earth, is to save lives from being lost in another such tragedy. To do what must be done, individually and collectively, to assure safe conditions underground," he said.

Let us hope that the President invokes a similarly passionate eulogy within a few weeks on behalf of the victims’ families and friends from the Transocean Deepwater Horizon platform tragedy.

Deepwater Horizon happened 15 days after W. Va mine tragedy

Like the mining industry, the offshore oil world has a track record of accidents, injuries and deaths.11 workers are missing and presumed dead from the Tuesday night explosion on the oil rig 50 miles south of Louisiana.

Thursday’s Houston Chronicle had a timely article about the safety record of oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico. The following is a summary of the report.

Since 2006 two people have been killed and 12 seriously injured from nine major rig fires. During that time there have been 509 total recorded platform fires overall.

Since 2006 the Chronicle found 35 fatal accidents in local records and news reports. According to an attorney cited in the article, accidents on Gulf platforms are underreported.

“There is a big difference between their actual incident/injury rate and their self-reported (rate),” this attorney said. “Often (company officials) deny an injury no matter what the doctors say.”

Transocean Ltd, the Houston-based owner of the Deepwater Horizon platform rocked by Tuesday night’s explosion, does not go unscathed in the Chronicle report.

In 2008 and 2009, 19 fires were reported aboard Transocean rigs with four of those fires resulting in workers seriously injured enough to be medivacced. The article states that “dozens” of cases have been filed against Transocean and interrelated companies in recent years. Many of those cases resulted in undisclosed settlements. The federal Minerals Management Service says that there have been 69 deaths, 1,349 injuries and 858 fires and explosion in the Gulf since 2001.

Should the President deliver a eulogy for the victims of the Deepwater Horizon, he would quickly be forgiven for delivering the same remarks except to substitute offshore terminology for mining terminology he used.

"All the hard work. All the hardship. All the time spent underground. It was all for their families,” Obama said in Beckley, West Virginia.

“For a car in the driveway. For a roof overhead," he said. "These miners lived -- as they died -- in pursuit of the American dream."

(Information in this article was obtained from FoxNews.com and the Houston Chronicle).

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