The relevant person in charge of the State Council's accident investigation team answered questions from reporters regarding the investigation of the "2.22" special major collapse accident in the open-pit coal mine of Inner Mongolia Alxa Xinjing Coal Industry Co., Ltd
Beijing, August 29th (Xinhua) - The State Council executive meeting recently approved the investigation report on the "2.22" special major collapse accident in the open-pit coal mine of Inner Mongolia Alxa Xinjing Coal Industry Co., Ltd. The reporter interviewed the relevant person in charge of the accident investigation team regarding the hot issues of social concern in the accident investigation.
Answer: After the accident, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council attach great importance to it. According to relevant laws and regulations, and with the approval of the State Council, a special investigation team for the "2.22" major collapse accident of the open-pit coal mine of Inner Mongolia Alashan Xinjing Coal Industry Co., Ltd. was established, led by the Ministry of Emergency Management, with the participation of the Ministry of Public Security, the National Mine Safety Supervision Bureau, the All China Federation of Trade Unions, and the People's Government of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Experts were hired to participate in the accident investigation.
The accident investigation team, with an attitude of being responsible to the Party and the people, as well as to society and history, adheres to the principles of "scientific rigor, legal compliance, seeking truth from facts, and emphasizing practical results". Through on-site investigation, surveying and mapping experiments, calculation analysis, and data retrieval, inquiry and conversation, and other methods, more than 1300 volumes of documents and materials were reviewed, 17 on-site investigations were conducted, and 231 inquiries and conversations were made. The team investigated the casualties, direct economic losses, occurrence process, causes, and relevant enterprise situations of the accident, identified the performance of local party committees, governments, relevant departments and units, identified problems and responsibilities, summarized the main lessons of the accident, and proposed suggestions for rectification and prevention measures.
The accident investigation team determined the direct cause of the accident through in-depth and meticulous investigation: failure to follow the preliminary design for construction, arbitrary merging of steps, formation of ultra-high and ultra steep slopes, continuous high-strength stripping of coal at the bottom of the mining site, resulting in a continuous decrease in slope stability and instability. The edge rock mass slides and collapses along the fault plane and joint surface, coupled with inadequate emergency response, and the failure to organize on-site workers to escape in a timely manner, causing significant casualties and property losses.
According to the investigation, this is a production safety responsibility accident caused by a company that illegally contracted construction units without mining construction qualifications to engage in long-term risky and reckless behavior during the period of converting from underground mining to open-pit technical transformation. The relevant departments' supervision and law enforcement were "loose and weak", and the local party committee and government were negligent in management and inspection, resulting in the long-term existence of major risks and hidden dangers.
The focus is on two key points: firstly, during the construction process of the Xinjing Coal Mine's conversion from underground mining to open-pit technical renovation project in 2012, it was exposed that the design unit's technical renovation project related plans were falsified, the relevant departments failed to comply with administrative approvals layer by layer, and issues such as the preliminary design and safety section of the Xinjing Coal Mine technical renovation project's open-pit surface boundary exceeding the mining permit scope were overlooked. Secondly, during the acceptance process for the resumption of work in Xinjing Coal Mine in 2021, approval for resumption of work was granted without proper rectification of issues such as excessive stripping and slope management, as well as issues such as illegal and irregular construction, construction, supervision, and production by enterprises after resumption of work, loose and weak supervision and law enforcement by relevant departments, and oversight by local party committees and governments.
The accident investigation team closely grasped these two key nodes and focused on investigating the Party committees, governments, energy, natural resources, emergency management, public security, and mining safety supervision departments and units of the Autonomous Region, Alxa League, and Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone. They proposed accountability suggestions for responsible personnel.
Answer: The accident investigation team found that there were many illegal and irregular behaviors in the coal mines, construction units, intermediary agencies, and supervision companies involved.
Serious illegal construction and production in coal mines. One is to produce while constructing. The Xinjing Coal Mine is in the construction stage, but it disregards legal requirements and organizes mining in violation of laws and regulations. From December 2020 to January 2023, it actually produced 2.45 million tons of raw coal. The second is cross-border mining. The mining certificate covers an area of 1.3448 square kilometers, and the actual stripping area of the mining site has reached 1.698 square kilometers; The southeastern area of the mining site is stripped beyond the mining certificate and design approval scope, with an area of approximately 29000 square meters. The third is illegal contracting to unqualified enterprises for construction. Xinjing Coal Mine has successively contracted the earthwork stripping project to Hongxinyao Company, which has no qualifications, and Ningxia Guben Company, which does not meet the qualifications for mining construction contracting. The fourth is the serious violation of organizational production, which poses significant hidden dangers. In order to produce more coal, reduce costs, violate the design and organization of construction, form ultra-high and steep steps, and artificially create major accident hazards. The fifth is that safety management is just a formality. Shareholders and their representatives directly direct production operations, while the "five mine managers" and functional departments fail to fulfill their legal responsibilities, fail to integrate unified coordination and management of safety production work in the construction unit, and there is a phenomenon of "outsourcing management". Sixth, there is a lack of technical management. There is no geological survey, production technology management department or personnel, no project construction organization design, stripping operation plan, and slope engineering monitoring plan prepared, and no analysis of slope stability conducted.
The construction unit engages in illegal and reckless behavior. One is unqualified construction. Ningxia Guben Company and Hongxinyao Company both have no qualifications for general contracting of mining engineering construction and illegally undertake engineering construction. The second is to work without considering safety risks. Randomly arrange drilling holes, frequently organize blasting at the bottom of high and steep step slopes, and adopt a "root out" stripping method. Effective measures have not been taken for the frequent occurrence of surface deformation, floating stone rolling, and other slope hazards. The third is chaotic safety management. The safety production management organization is not sound, the rules and regulations are not perfect, and hidden danger investigation and treatment have not been carried out for a long time. Safety training and emergency drills have never been organized. The fourth is inadequate emergency response. On February 19 and 20, 2023, dangerous situations such as falling rocks and umbrella eaves were found on the slope of the western area, and no disposal measures were taken to continue operations; On the day of the incident, after discovering the signs of the accident, the on-site workers were not organized to evacuate in a timely and effective manner.
Intermediaries and supervision companies intentionally engage in fraud. One is the falsification of evaluation reports. Inner Mongolia Coal Research Institute has prepared preliminary design and development plans for inconsistent mining boundaries in the energy and natural resources departments; The slope stability evaluation report issued is seriously inconsistent with the actual situation. The second is the falsification of supervision contracts. Tianzhu Yinchuan Branch privately carved the seal of Shandong Tianzhu Company and signed an engineering supervision contract with Xinjing Coal Mine. In fact, Ningxia Zhengxin Company is responsible for the engineering supervision. The third issue is the falsification of annual reports on mining reserves. The resource reserves used in the 2021 and 2022 annual reports of Xinjing Coal Mine prepared by Yicheng Exploration Company are 0 million tons, which is seriously inconsistent with the actual situation.
Answer: The accident investigation team has identified problems in the regulatory performance of relevant departments and local party committees and governments.
The relevant departments have lax and untrue supervision. One is the failure of administrative approval at all levels. In 2013, the former Inner Mongolia Coal Industry Bureau and the former Inner Mongolia Coal Mine Safety Supervision Bureau did not find any issues with the design surface boundary exceeding the scope of mining rights during the review of the preliminary design and safety section of the Xinjing Coal Mine's open-pit technical renovation project. Since 2020, the Department of Natural Resources of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and the Natural Resources Bureau of Alxa League have continued to handle the procedures for the conversion of underground mining to open-pit mining and the continuation of mining operations in the case of cross boundary stripping of Xinjing coal mine. The second is the inadequate investigation and punishment of cross-border stripping. In 2017, after the Land and Resources Bureau of the former Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone imposed administrative penalties on the excessive stripping of mining areas, it was not supervised and returned to the approved scope. Since 2021 until the incident, the Natural Resources Bureau of the Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone has conducted more than 50 inspections, and the Natural Resources Bureau of Alxa League has conducted 4 inspections. However, they have not supervised and rectified the issue of boundary stripping in the Xinjing coal mine, and have respectively issued opinions of agreement during the initial review of the extension of mining permits and the conversion of mining workers to open-pit mining. The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Department of Natural Resources has not found any problems in the development and utilization plan, such as mismatched mining rights and mining methods, unreasonable service life, and resource utilization. The third issue is the lax inspection of resumption of work. On March 24, 2021, the Development, Reform, and Economic Statistics Bureau of the Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone conducted on-site supervision and rectification on the issues raised during the inspection and feedback of the resumption of work organized by the Alxa League Safety Committee Office on March 12. In the event that issues such as excessive stripping and slope management were not rectified properly, it was requested to resume work. On April 2, the Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone Management Committee approved the resumption of work. The fourth is that regulatory supervision is not truthful, and major hidden dangers are ignored. In response to media reports that "no mandatory measures were taken for 13 regulatory and law enforcement actions", after investigation, from 2021 until before the incident, the Development, Reform and Economic Statistics Bureau of the Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone conducted more than 80 inspections, and the Energy Bureau of Alxa League conducted 3 inspections, all of which did not carry out special inspections on open-pit coal mine slope management in Xinjing Coal Mine. The Inner Mongolia Energy Bureau and the Inner Mongolia Bureau of the National Mine Safety Supervision Bureau each conducted three inspections, and only once requested correction for the problem of excessive height in the lowest step of the mining site, and the rectification was not tracked and implemented properly.
Local party committees and governments have neglected management and oversight. The Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone is not equipped with regulatory forces that are suitable for coal mine safety supervision tasks. Failure to effectively supervise and inspect the performance of safety production supervision responsibilities by relevant departments of the demonstration zone management committee, failure to effectively stop Xinjing Coal Mine from organizing construction according to the design, lax approval of resumption of work and acceptance inspection of Xinjing Coal Mine, and failure to manage and inspect the problem of long-term boundary stripping and high-strength production organization while construction in Xinjing Coal Mine. The Alashan League prioritizes development over safety, and the League Administration has held two meetings, deciding to list the newly constructed coal mine as a guaranteed supply coal mine for 2022 and assigning a task of 200000 tons of guaranteed supply; Failure to effectively supervise and guide relevant departments and the Shuangjingtan Demonstration Zone to conscientiously fulfill their safety production responsibilities, and failure to effectively prevent illegal and irregular issues such as failure to organize construction according to design, boundary stripping, and long-term high-intensity organization of production at Xinjing Coal Mine. Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region failed to effectively supervise the relevant departments of the autonomous region to fulfill their responsibilities in coal mine safety supervision in accordance with the law and regulations; Failure to effectively supervise Alxa League to fulfill its responsibilities related to coal mine safety production in accordance with laws and regulations.
Answer: The lessons learned from this accident are very profound, exposing many weak links and problems in the field of safety production.
One is that the concept of safe development is not solid, and there is a serious deviation between coordinated development and safety. Some places and leading cadres regard coal mines that do not have safety conditions as important growth points for economic development, turning a blind eye to the long-term major accident hazards in coal mines, ultimately leading to tragic accidents. The second issue is that the lessons learned from accidents are not profound enough, and they have repeatedly made the same mistakes. A particularly serious coal mine accident occurred in Inner Mongolia, but the risk awareness and attention to high-risk mining industries are insufficient, and the lessons learned from accidents are not profound enough. Thirdly, the spirit of regulatory law enforcement struggle is insufficient, the quality of hazard investigation and rectification is not high, and some places and departments lack a strong willingness to identify and solve problems. Administrative approval is repeatedly neglected, and regulatory supervision dare not take real actions, resulting in some obvious major hazards that persist for a long time and cause irreparable losses. The fourth is the serious failure to implement the main responsibility of enterprises, illegal and irregular construction and production without a bottom line, accident coal mines ignoring safety production laws and regulations, blindly demanding output and benefits, construction units contracting and subcontracting in violation of regulations, illegal command and risky operations, construction teams taking up positions without training, intermediary agencies engaging in fraud, issuing false design schemes and lending supervision qualifications in violation of laws and regulations. The fifth issue is the unreasonable layout of resource planning, poor safety conditions in small mines, unscientific development planning of mineral resources in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, unreasonable setting of some mining rights, low resource utilization rate, and the phenomenon of "multiple, small, and scattered" mines still exist. These small mines are "congenital deficiencies" and difficult to plan and design scientifically in the long run.
Answer: In order to draw lessons from accidents, deepen safety prevention work, and resolutely prevent similar accidents from happening again, the accident investigation team has proposed six improvement measures and suggestions:
Secondly, we will comprehensively carry out special inspections and rectification actions for major mining accidents and hidden dangers, tighten responsibility measures, increase efforts to rectify major accident hazards, and maintain a high-pressure situation of cracking down on illegal activities and rectifying violations. The third is to effectively enhance the strong willingness and ability to discover and solve problems, strengthen the sense of responsibility and work style construction, resolutely rectify problems such as loose and weak law enforcement inspections, improve work mechanisms, and strengthen professional regulatory forces. The fourth is to comprehensively improve the safety conditions and management level of enterprises, study and formulate policy measures to improve the mining conditions, strengthen monitoring and early warning of mining safety risks, comprehensively identify hidden disaster causing factors such as slope faults and goaf, and strictly implement governance measures. The fifth is to strictly rectify and regulate the employment behavior of intermediary institutions, establish and improve systems for project management, internal review, professional ethics, etc., increase supervision and inspection efforts, and seriously deal with illegal and irregular behaviors. The sixth is to accelerate the high-quality development of mines, strengthen mine planning and management, accelerate intelligent construction, improve relevant systems for mineral resource conservation and comprehensive utilization, and promote the transformation and upgrading of the mining industry.
