Mar. 6--CARLSBAD -- The U.S. Department of Labor's Mine Safety and Health Administration has announced it has assessed $165,000 in fines against Intrepid Potash NM in the August 2008 electrocution of a mine shift foreman.

On Aug. 6, 2008, Jeffrey R. Franklin, a shift foreman with 15 years experience, was fatally injured on the surface of the Intrepid Potash East Mine east of Carlsbad when he came into contact with energized parts of a steel water line.

The 38-year-old Franklin contacted conductors for a heat tape that had been installed in a shared conduit body with the conductors of a 480-volt electrical circuit. One of the conductors short-circuited to the heater tape, which was attached to the water line. The heat tape overheated and portions of the heat tape insulation melted away, leaving bare conductors.

"This tragic accident occurred because management policies and procedures failed to ensure that all potential electrical hazards in the plant were identified and corrected properly," said Michael A. Davis, MSHA's deputy assistant secretary for operations.

Accident investigators concluded that the conduit body was not effectively grounded, the 480-volt circuit was not protected from overloads with a properly sized circuit breaker, the conductors inside the conduit body were not protected from mechanical damage and the two abandoned circuits were not removed.

Three contributory citations of $55,000 each were issued to the mine operator for having the

wrong capacity circuit breaker, failure to protect the conductors from mechanical damage and failure to effectively ground the lighting circuit.

A spokesman at Intrepid's Denver headquarters could not be reached for comment Thursday.

-----

To see more of the Carlsbad Current-Argus, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.currentargus.com.

Copyright (c) 2009, Carlsbad Current-Argus, N.M.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

A service of YellowBrix, Inc.