At least 25 miners have died in an explosion at a coal mine in West Virginia. Although the cause of the blast has yet to be determined, the safety record of the company that owns the mine isn't reassuring as these paragraphs from the NYT's story make clear:

For at least six of the last 10 years, federal records indicate, the Upper Big Branch mine has recorded an injury rate worse than the national average for similar operations. The records also show that the mine had 458 violations in 2009, with $897,325 in safety penalties assessed against it, of which it has paid $168,393.

“Massey’s [the company that owns the mine] commitment to safety has long been questioned in the coalfields,” said Tony Oppegard, a lawyer and mine safety advocate from Kentucky.

Those concerns were heightened in 2006 when an internal memo written by Mr. Blankenship [Massey Energy's CEO] became public. In the memo, Mr. Blankenship instructed the company’s underground mine superintendents to place coal production first.

“This memo is necessary only because we seem not to understand that the coal pays the bills,” he wrote.

See this FDL post for more on Blankenship.