{"id":46,"date":"2014-04-09T01:21:47","date_gmt":"2014-04-09T01:21:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/?p=46"},"modified":"2016-11-30T17:33:18","modified_gmt":"2016-11-30T22:33:18","slug":"might-we-have-a-watergate-like-circumstance-on-our-hands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/?p=46","title":{"rendered":"Might We Have a Watergate-Like Circumstance on our Hands?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Don Blankenship<\/em><\/p>\n

Watergate didn\u2019t cost Nixon the Presidency because he broke into the\u00a0democratic campaign offices.\u00a0 What did cost him was that he helped cover it up. \u00a0Essentially,\u00a0Nixon may not have known about the break-in originally, but he didn\u2019t inform the public as soon as he did know.<\/p>\n

Could what we are experiencing today regarding UBB turn out to be similar?\u00a0 The politicians (Congress and maybe even the White House) may not have been aware (as Senator Manchin says he was not<\/a>) that the UBB explosion was clearly fueled by \u201cnatural gas\u201d as opposed to gas coming from the coal seam. \u00a0 It\u2019s possible this could be true\u00a0even though we were telling everyone that would listen that it was natural gas once the gas sample analyses\u00a0were available to us nearly four years ago. Additionally\u00a0the Mine Safety and Health Administration has been very unfair to the Congress, the President,\u00a0and many others because they have\u00a0never publicly stated that the gas was not coal gas.<\/p>\n

The question now is are the Congressional members from West Virginia and elsewhere asking to see the gas samples and their analytical\u00a0results? \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0If they are not, why not? \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 If they are what are they learning and when will they tell the public?<\/p>\n

Casual observers and very busy legislators could easily be confused by the terms coal bed methane, coal gas, natural gas, and methane.\u00a0 Senator Manchin seemed confused when he was asked whether he knew that the government\u2019s own gas samples after the explosion showed the gas to be natural gas (See short 4 minute\u00a0video at ubbneveragain.com<\/a>). \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0The Senator responded \u201cOh methane you mean the coal bed methane and they hit pockets of\u00a0 . . . (natural gas)\u00a0I never heard that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Explaining these four\u00a0terms can\u00a0be tricky, but in the context miners use them \u201ccoal gas\u201d and \u201ccoal bed methane\u201d are the same exact thing.\u00a0 These are the gases that are released from the coal when it is mined.\u00a0 Coal gas is nearly pure methane.\u00a0 \u201cMethane\u201d is a chemical compound with the chemical formula CH4. \u00a0\u00a0Natural gas as coal miners use the term is gas that comes from the ground or shale or someplace other than from the coal.<\/p>\n

Chemists can easily tell the difference between what is commonly called by the miners and the public \u201cnatural gas\u201d and \u201ccoal gas\u201d by their chemical compound.\u00a0 \u201cCoal gas\u201d is almost pure methane.\u00a0 However, \u201cnatural gas\u201d contains higher percentages of\u00a0other gases such as ethane. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0This is what the experts explain in the documentary.<\/p>\n

In summary, the UBB gas that exploded was what is commonly called natural gas.\u00a0 The gas clearly did not come from the coal seam.\u00a0 Additionally, it came out at a rate several times the volume that the mine would have ever released due to mining.\u00a0 Neither of these facts can be reasonably disputed.\u00a0 The government experts know this. \u00a0 Legislators may or may not have\u00a0understood\u00a0this before last week but\u00a0they\u00a0now know or can easily know if they simply ask a chemist. \u00a0 The chemist will tell them\u00a0the gas did not come from the coal.<\/p>\n

What we don\u2019t need now is “GASGATE”.\u00a0\u00a0 We need to get on with the truth and make every effort to make sure UBB\u00a0never happens again.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Don Blankenship Watergate didn\u2019t cost Nixon the Presidency because he broke into the\u00a0democratic campaign offices.\u00a0 What did cost him was that he helped cover it up. \u00a0Essentially,\u00a0Nixon may not have known about the break-in originally, but he didn\u2019t inform the public as soon as he did know. Could what we are experiencing today regarding UBB turn out to be … <\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46\/revisions\/214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ubbneveragain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}