Former W.Va. Sheriff Reflects On Sago Mine Disaster, 10 Years Later

UPSHUR COUNTY, W.Va. (KDKA) – Saturday marks 10 years since one of the most shocking, confusing and heartbreaking events in this region's history – the Sago Mine disaster.

It was initially reported that all but one of the trapped miners were alive -- when it fact, only one survived.

In Upshur County, W.Va., things are timeless. The farms and their livestock, the mountain streams, and the hills and mountains seem to never change, save one.

"I just happened to be out one day when I was working and went by the mine," former Upshur County sheriff Virgil Miller said. "I saw a bulldozer up on the side of the hill, shoving dirt down over the porthole. Closed the mine, all the buildings are gone."

For 3 days in 2006, the world's eyes were fixed on the little town in the mountain state's high coal country.

"I remember it just as vivid as if it happened this morning," Miller said.

It began Jan. 2 with a rumble from deep inside the earth.

"There was this real loud boom and then the pictures [on the wall of his home] and everything just shook," Miller said.

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Virgil Miller heard what had happened on the police radio, left his home and headed to the mine.

"There was just a dark gray smoke rolling out of the porthole of the mine," Miller said. "I knew then, this was bad."

Unaccounted for were 13 miners. Several of Miller's friends were on the missing crew.

"I knew Fred Ware, Junior Hamner, Marty Bennett," he said. "I knew those three."

Miller watched the mine rescue crews funnel in and out of the mine. Forty-one hours into the operation, word of a miracle – the miners were all alive.

Waiting at nearby St. Joseph Hospital was Virgil Miller. Survivor Randy McCloy's ambulance was the only one to arrive. There should have been more.

"I'm saying, 'This is not right. Something's not right here,'" Miller said. "Then I got the phone call that they, in fact, they were dead."

In 41 hours, emotions went from fear to hope to joy to painful rage.

"I don't know that I've ever been anywhere where I saw such a mood swing," Miller said.

And for Virgil Miller, pain over the loss of his friends, especially crew leader Fred Ware.

"Fred, you saw Fred, he always had a smile on his face," Miller said. "He was a good guy. We worked together at another mine."

The funerals, the investigations, the fines would come in the days, months and years that would follow. The world's eyes went on to the next big tragedy, and Upshur County…

"Like all places that have a disaster, we'll get by, we'll make it," Miller said.

But moving on and making it are not the same thing as healing.

"I think as long as our generation that lived through that is still alive, this community will never heal," Miller said. "That will always be there."