A West Virginia coal miner was killed after being caught in a conveyor belt in an underground Randolph County mine, officials said Monday.
Howard T. Harris, a 54-year-old electrician, died Saturday night after getting pinned between the conveyor belt and the rollers of a belt-storage dolly, said C.A. Phillips, deputy director of the state Office of Miners’ Health, Safety and Training.
Harris died at the Pleasant Hill Mine, southwest of Elkins near the community of Mabie. It is owned by the Carter Roag Coal Co., a subsidiary of United Coal of Bristol, Va.
Calls to the company were not immediately returned Monday.
It is the fifth coal mining death in the state in 2007, according to official counts. A sixth death, on Sept. 26 at a mine in Logan County, has not been added to the tally as officials await a final report from the state medical examiner.
If both deaths are added to the national total, that will bring to 26 the number of fatal mining accidents in 2007, according to the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration.
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