March 26, 2007	Monday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 6, 1428

OSINNIKI (Russia): Coal is so deeply ingrained in this Siberian community that everywhere you go, the snow is stained black with coal dust and soot.

But after an explosion at a nearby pit killed at least 108 people last week, this town is having doubts about the profession that has provided it with a decent but dangerous living for generations.

A slim, 19-year-old mining apprentice, Dmitry Yershov has spent the week watching footage of body bags being brought out from the Ulyanovskaya mine, scene of Russia's deadliest mine accident since the end of the Soviet Union.

“It was really scary to watch the television reports over the past few days,” he said. “In fact, at times it's really scary to go underground.”

The Ulyanovskaya disaster hit Osinniki: the town was last week burying 17 residents who were killed at the mine.

More than 3,000 km away from Moscow's hustle and bustle, Osinniki, a bleak town with a population of over 60,000, is defined by its industrial heritage.

It is part of a sprawling network of industrial towns with the city of Novokuznetsk at its hub.

Built in the 1930s as part of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin's industrialisation drive, the area is a landscape of mines, metal works spewing smoke that leaves a salty taste in the mouth, and peeling Soviet apartment blocks and wooden barracks.

Despite the dangers, men go down the mines because it is in their blood — some families lost fathers, brothers and sons in the Ulyanovskaya disaster — and for money.

“I come from a large family and I need money,” Yershov said when asked why he signed on as a mine apprentice. “I could have chosen another job, but just so many of my friends are working in the pit.”

The pay is not generous. As an apprentice, Yershov's monthly pay is 5,000 roubles ($190), a far cry from the national average of about $450. But it is better than other options in the area.

Now though, he is reassessing whether the money justifies the risk. Even as the region was mourning the Ulyanovskaya dead, workers at the nearby Alardinskaya mine where Yershov works were evacuated because of smoke underground.

FADED GLORY: A miner's life was always hazardous, but in Soviet times they had social status. They were popularly known as the “working aristocracy” and their wages and social benefits were far higher than in the rest of the egalitarian economy.

Soviet propaganda did its best to glorify the producers of the “black gold” that drove the Soviet economy.

Alexei Stakhanov, a miner who broke records for coal output, was glorified. “Stakhanovite drives” were launched to boost production in other sectors of the economy.

“Glory to miners,” says a huge Soviet-era banner made of reinforced concrete that greets newcomers to Novokuznetsk.

“Black gold is the pride of the Kuznetsk area,” reads another.

Alongside pot-holed roads are simple shrines to dead miners and cemeteries where fathers and sons killed on the same shift share a plot.

“I feel the authorities treat miners like scum these days, while society is just indifferent,” said Alexei, in his mid-30s.

He used to be an electrician but has been working at the local Osinnikovskaya mine for five years because his monthly salary of 18,000 roubles ($692) is more than he could earn elsewhere.

Like other miners, he said safety standards throughout the industry were sacrificed for high production.—Reuters