Last day: Coal miners: masters of their trade

First of all let me say that it has been a great week working with all the teachers, miners, board staff and business men and women. I met some really great people on this trip and I hope that we continue to keep in touch.

I am glad that we did the tour of the underground mine on the last day because had it been earlier in the week, it would have been a tough act to follow. Since our group was so large, we had to break up into two smaller groups. I was in the first group to get to go down. My headlamp went out before we even made it down to the mine so the head of safety, Clark gave me his to wear because he was "used to the dark." As we were driving down to the mine, a piece of the roof came down at hit the car and scared us all! The second group that went down had a power outage and was able to experience "total darkness." We spent about two hours down there and met some very skilled professionals. Our tour guides Jack, James, Clark, Neil and Willis were all very knowledgeable and seemed genuinely honored to show us around. We saw a continuous miner and loading car, coal belt that carried the coal out from the mine and Neil measure the straightness of the ceiling with lasers (which was pretty cool.)

The miners took a lunch break while we were underground and it was great getting to talk to them. Clark showed us a microwave oven that was mainly used to heat up food or pop popcorn and told us that there was usually a coffee pot down there. The miners sat on metal a picnic table and looked just at home underground as they would have above ground. Everyone that we met had years and years of experience and were 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation coal miners.

Probably the most enjoyable part of this trip was going down and speaking with the miners at shift change. I met so many, but one guy named Mark from Blackberry, Kentucky stood out in my mind. As Kellie (Wood) and I were talking to him and a few others about all that we had seen during the visit, we told Mark about what a great thing we thought that he and the other miners were doing. He explained to us that the media portrays miners like outlaws and it was up to us to share what we had experienced during this trip. He shook our hands and told us to not think that what we are doing is any less important and he thanked us for our service. It took me by surprise that here we were praising him for what he does and he turned it back on us to thank us in return. It was a great feeling.