By Vicki Smith The Associated Press September 26, 2006
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- Two men who worked at the Sago Mine on the day of a deadly explosion have committed suicide in the past month, a continuation of the January tragedy that had already claimed 12 lives.
Neither man had been blamed for contributing to the disaster, and neither victim's family has linked the suicides to the accident. But those who knew them say there's little doubt the tragedy haunted them.
"I'm not sure anybody ever gets over it," said Vickie Boni, the ex-wife of one victim. "You live with it every day."
John Nelson Boni, whose job was to maintain water pumps on the day of the blast, killed himself Saturday in Volga, though his ex-wife did not say how. He was 63.
William Lee "Flea" Chisolm, the 47-year-old dispatcher responsible for monitoring carbon monoxide alarms and communicating with crews underground that morning, shot himself at his Belington home Aug. 29, authorities confirmed Tuesday.
State and federal investigators have not determined the cause of the Jan. 2 blast, but a spokeswoman for the federal Mine Safety & Health Administration said both men had been thoroughly interviewed, and there were no plans to re-interview them.
The agency is still working on its report and cannot say when it might be released, said MSHA spokeswoman Amy Louviere.
Neither man worked for mine owner International Coal Group Inc. at the time of his death.
Friends and family say Boni had retired after the accident that killed 12 men and severely injured survivor Randal McCloy Jr.
Chisolm had left the mine about a week before his suicide, said Randolph County Sheriff Jack Roy.
ICG spokesman Ira Gamm could not immediately say whether Chisolm had quit or had been fired.
"Our thoughts and prayers go out to each of their families," Gamm said in a prepared statement.
Members of the Chisolm family did not immediately return telephone messages Tuesday, but Boni's ex-wife said the heartache of Sago is not easily forgotten.
Though Boni had never discussed the accident with her, "I'm sure it had weighed on his mind," said Vickie Boni, who divorced Boni 15 years ago but saw him when he picked up their daughter for visits.
Her own father died in a coal mine accident when she was a teenager.
"It's something you never get over," she said.
It was not immediately clear whether Boni left a note. Chisolm did not, the sheriff said, but relatives told investigators Chisolm had been depressed about personal matters and drinking heavily in the weeks before his death. Chisolm's obituary also said he had been ill.
Chisolm's brother was visiting just before the suicide. As he prepared to leave, Chisolm called out "and more or less said, 'I'll be seeing you,"' the sheriff said.
Chisolm had 11 years of mining experience and had worked at Sago for a year before the accident. Boni had worked as a coal miner for 36 years and had been at Sago since October 2004.
Sago was the worst mining disaster in West Virginia since 1968, when 78 miners died in an explosion at Farmington. The accident spurred Congress to pass the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act the following year.
Chisolm was the dispatcher on duty Jan. 2, while Boni was part of the crew that escaped the blast.
In interviews with investigators, Chisolm said a carbon monoxide alarm had sounded at 6:10 a.m., about 20 minutes before the explosion. Following ICG procedure, he alerted the crew and asked them to verify the report from a system that had a history of malfunctioning.
During a public hearing on the disaster in May, ICG executive Sam Kitts said mines are not required to evacuate when there is an alarm; they verify it, then decide how to proceed.
"The dispatcher did what he was supposed to do. He notified a maintenance person who was then able to go up and check the sensor before they would have again advanced onto the section," Kitts testified.
Though the investigations continue, ICG believes an unusually powerful lightning strike somehow ignited methane gas that had accumulated naturally in a worked-out section of the mine.
Boni, who was certified as a fireboss and occasionally conducted pre-shift safety inspections, told investigators he had detected low levels of methane in that area five days earlier and reported his findings to a supervisor, who was not alarmed.
The morning of the blast, though, Boni was restarting a water pump in the mine. He escaped after the blast with co-worker Ron Grall and the rest of their crew.
Although Boni retired after the accident, the two men spoke by phone a few weeks later.
"He said he just had enough of it," Grall said Tuesday. "The job wasn't stressful. It was just the way the investigators treated him. They treated me the same way. They acted like it was our fault, like we did it.
"The way I look at it, it wasn't nobody's fault," he said. "It was one of those freaks of nature that hardly ever happens. It probably happens once in a hundred years, and it may never happen again."
Grall said he hadn't talked to Chisolm or Boni recently but wouldn't be surprised if the accident had haunted them. It's on the mind of every miner.
"It's just like there's a dark cloud over the whole place," he said.
ICG provided grief counseling to Sago employees after the accident and has since renewed the offer.
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