MINE DETAILS
Pax South Surface Mine
MSHA MINE ID4606877
LOCATION
Mine location
1 of 1 mine with usable MSHA coordinates. Select a marker to open a mine.
Mine coordinates
- Pax South Surface Mine37.92861, -81.28250Open map ↗
Quarterly trends
2025 Q1 – 2026 Q4
Database snapshot · 2026-10-13. MSHA quarterly production and employment reports.
Coal production
—reported short tons
Hours worked
—reported employee hours
Tons per hour
—production ÷ hours worked
Missing values appear as —. Totals use available reports. Tons per hour requires production and hours for the same quarters and a nonzero hours total. * Striped bars mark partial mine coverage or an incomplete quarter. See the table for coverage.
Quarterly data and reporting coverage
| Quarter | Coal (short tons) | Hours worked | Tons / hour | Avg. employees | Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 Q1 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2025 Q2 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2025 Q3 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2025 Q4 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2026 Q1 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2026 Q2 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2026 Q3 | — | — | — | — | No report |
| 2026 Q4 | — | — | — | — | No report |
Safety and enforcement
2025-01-01 – 2026-10-13
Violations
00 significant & substantial (S&S)
Accident records
00 records classified as fatality
Proposed penalties · USD
—0 of 0 violations with amounts
On-site inspection hours
—0 inspections · 0 with hours
Counts are published records, including contractor records. * The quarter was incomplete at the snapshot date; recent counts may rise as reports arrive. — means no reported amount or hours. Portfolio totals use current membership.
Quarterly safety data
| Quarter | Violations | S&S | Proposed USD | Accident records | Fatality records | Inspections | On-site hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-Q1 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2025-Q2 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2025-Q3 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2025-Q4 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2026-Q1 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2026-Q2 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2026-Q3 | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
| 2026-Q4 * | 0 | 0 | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | — |
Most cited CFR sections
All violations issued in the selected period. Counts combine subsections.
| Section | Violations | S&S |
|---|
No violation records in this period.
Safety activity
No matching records in this period.
Safety sources and definitions
MSHA Violations (issue date), Accidents (accident date), and Inspections (begin date). Snapshot 2026-10-13.
Counts describe published rows, including contractor records; accident records are not distinct incidents or numbers of people injured.
Zero means no matching records in the imported sources, not proof of no events. Historical coverage differs by source; absence before a source begins reporting is not a zero incident rate. Invalid or absent dates and records after the snapshot are excluded.
S&S means SIG_SUB=Y. Fatality records use DEGREE_INJURY_CD=01. Proposed penalties are not final assessed or paid amounts; missing dollar values are omitted.
Inspection hours are SUM_TOTAL_ON_SITE_HOURS attributed to the inspection start date, without supervisor/trainee hours. Missing hours are omitted; a started inspection may still be open.
Portfolio totals use current mine membership, including events before the current owner or operator's tenure.
CFR headings link to the current Title 30 index; they are not historical legal determinations.
EIA-923 · COAL RECEIPTS
Coal shipments and quality
Receipts reported by power plants and terminals, matched by MSHA mine ID.
No receipts matched this mine in the selected period. EIA-923 does not cover all mine sales, exports or metallurgical coal shipments.
Delivered cost includes transport and is not mine revenue. Missing prices remain blank. * Fewer than three months are published in the selected quarter. Receipts reflect the months EIA has published; an unfinished quarter is not comparable with a full quarter. Portfolio matches use current ownership.
Coverage, sources and calculations
- Reported coal receipts at EIA-923 power plants/terminals; this is not a census of mine shipments, exports or metallurgical sales.
- Matches use only the published MSHA ID, normalized to seven digits. Unidentified mine origins remain in the source table but are not assigned to a mine.
- Portfolio attribution uses current MSHA ownership, not ownership at the shipment date. Receipts and production can differ because of timing, stocks and coverage.
- Quality means are weighted by positive reported tons with that measurement. Delivered cost uses only rows with published cost, positive heat and positive tons; missing/withheld costs are never zero-filled.
- USD/ton = (cents/MMBtu ÷ 100) × MMBtu/ton. This is plant delivered cost, not mine sales price or revenue.
- Receipt month is as published, including records supplied by annual respondents. Recent months are preliminary and subject to revision. Missing rows do not prove zero shipments.
Imported releases start 2008-01. This window includes 12 published months. EIA releases · Survey instructions
- 2026 · preliminary · EIA923_Schedules_2_3_4_5_M_07_2026_21SEP2026.xlsx · Page 5 Fuel Receipts and Costs
- 2025 · final · EIA923_Schedules_2_3_4_5_M_12_2025_Final.xlsx · Page 5 Fuel Receipts and Costs
EIA ANNUAL COAL REPORT · 2024
Coal prices and estimated revenue
Annual county prices and a production-based allocation of county coal sales.
The estimate assumes each eligible mine receives its county-average price and shares county sales in proportion to production. Actual sales and prices can differ substantially. Unavailable estimates are excluded; this is not a total for the whole portfolio. 1 current coal members have no matching annual record; their coverage is unknown. Annual price data uses a separate window from the MSHA charts.
| Mine / county | Annual production · tons | County FOB · USD/ton | Est. sales · tons | Est. coal revenue · USD | Basis / availability |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pax South Surface Mine4606877 · Location unavailable | — | — | — | — | No matching annual production record |
Method, assumptions and source records
- This is an annual county-sales allocation, not reported mine or company revenue. Currency is nominal USD in the source year; quantities are short tons.
- Mine share = same-year annual mine production / eligible same-county production. Estimated sales = published county sales × share. Estimated coal revenue = estimated sales × published county average FOB price.
- The model assumes eligible mines share county sales in proportion to production and receive the county-average price. Matching mine counts is a check, not proof of identical respondents. Mine quality, contracts and sales timing can differ substantially. No statistical confidence interval is implied.
- FOB excludes transport and insurance. EIA-923 delivered costs do not enter this model. No grade premium, state/national fallback, quarterly apportionment or carry-forward to a later year is applied.
- Eligibility follows the source's production threshold and excludes preparation-only and refuse operations. Withheld values, inconsistent county counts and missing/ambiguous locations produce no estimate.
- County sales are published in thousands of tons and prices to cents. Calculations retain precision, but the inputs are rounded and the allocation is approximate.
- Portfolio attribution uses current MSHA ownership, not ownership during the sales year. Covered-mine sums exclude unavailable estimates and must not be read as whole-company revenue. Coverage denominators use the annual EIA mine-production release.
Sales-reporting threshold: 50,000 short tons per mine in 2024. Withheld sales or prices stay unavailable.
EIA Table 30 · county sales and FOB prices · EIA annual mine production · Release index
Annual report released November 19, 2025. Method: county-sales-allocation-v1. JSON and CSV preserve source row numbers and file checksums.
OWNERSHIP
Operator and controller history
Current ownership comes from MSHA Mines. Historical start and end dates come from MSHA Controller and Operator History.
—
Alpha Natural Resources, Inc.controlsSimmons Fork Mining, Inc.operatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Foundation Coal CorporationcontrolsSimmons Fork Mining, Inc.operatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Rag AktiengesellschaftcontrolsSimmons Fork Mining, Inc.operatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Energy Coal Resources InccontrolsAppalachian Fuels LLCoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
John C Smith JrcontrolsAppalachian Fuels LLCoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Amon L MahoncontrolsIsland Fork Construction LTDoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
William L CookcontrolsWilliam Ann Enterprises, Inc.operatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Amon L MahoncontrolsIsland Fork Construction, LTDoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Iracoal IncorporatedcontrolsLodestar Energy IncoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Costain Group PLCcontrolsCostain Mining IncoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Jack L WilliamscontrolsPax Mining CompanyoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Michael C FaykuscontrolsProsperity Energy IncoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877—
Graybeal Carl N & Jack L WilliamscontrolsTamroy Mining IncoperatesPax South Surface Mine
msha-controller-operator-history · controller/operator co-tenure derived on mine 4606877Other historical summaries · source-specific periods
RECORD SUMMARY
Production, safety and enforcement
These summaries use the periods stated on each card, independently of the reporting period above.
01 / SAFETYneutral
Accidents and injuries
32 historical accident/injury rows; 0 coded fatalities and 1,100 lost days across the published record.
ACCIDENT + INJURY RECORD0 since 2021
accidentsmine-production-quarterly02 / COMPLIANCEneutral
Violations and penalties
105 violation rows across the full record; 73 carry an S&S flag and $14,518 appears in current assessed amounts.
ENFORCEMENT ACTIVITY0 since 2021
inspectionsviolationsassessed-violationsorders-107a03 / HEALTHwatch
Occupational health samples
44 coal dust; 2 coal quartz; 5 noise. 0 personal-sample rows have a published C/E ratio above 1; 1 noise rows have an action-level or PEL dose above 100%. These are separate measures, not a silica exceedance count. Silica results and sample status are shown separately.
OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURE51 samples
coal-dust-samplesquartz-samplesnoise-samples04 / PRODUCTIONcontext
Quarterly production and employment
17K employee hours and 47 summed average employees across reported subunits in the latest published quarter.
2006-Q237K tons
mine-production-quarterlymine-production-yearly05 / LEGALwatch
Contests, conferences and decisions
0 contested-violation rows, 0 civil-penalty docket/decision rows, and 5 conference records linked by issuance number.
POST-ISSUANCE LIFECYCLE5 linked rows
conferencescontested-violationscivil-penalty-dockets-decisions06 / CONTRACTORScontext
Contractors
Contractors are linked through this mine’s violation or accident records. Their production and hours cover all their operations, so they are not included in this mine’s totals.
ENTITY-LEVEL CONTEXT11 linked entities
contractor-production-quarterlycontractor-production-yearlyaccidentsviolations07 / INSPECTIONScontext
Inspections
40 inspection events and 823 published inspection hours across the historical record.
OVERSIGHT COVERAGE0 since 2021
inspectionsviolationsHEALTH SAMPLING
Silica and quartz
Coal quartz, metal/nonmetal personal samples and area samples. Snapshot Oct 13, 2026. 2 silica records across the mine’s published history.
Coal quartz concentration
Quarterly mean · µg/m³ · not-voided samples
— No eligible measurements. * Quarter in progress. Means describe the available samples, not average exposure across the mine.
Quartz % is the sample’s quartz content; µg/m³ is its reported concentration. Personal C/E is the ratio to the limit published with that sample. Personal and area concentration units and void status are not specified in those source files.
| Date / sample | Dataset / analyte | Occupation / area | Measurement | Sample status | Published action |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No silica records match these filters. Missing samples do not establish safe conditions. | |||||
Sources and interpretation
- Coal means use numeric concentrations from samples marked not voided, excluding control/invalid sample types and dates after the snapshot. Missing values remain null; reported zeroes remain zero.
- Quarterly means describe available samples, not mine-wide or worker-average exposure. Quarters with no eligible measurements remain empty; the current quarter is partial.
- Personal C/E is MSHA's published concentration-to-limit ratio. A value above 1 is not by itself a citation or a determination under the 2024 silica rule. Personal and area files do not publish a void-status field.
- Area records include bulk-dust analyses and are kept separate from personal exposure results. Their concentration units are not specified in the source dictionary.
- Missing samples do not establish safe conditions. Coal quartz percentage and concentration are separate measures. No compliance threshold is inferred for coal samples.
Coal quartz field definitions ↗Metal/nonmetal personal field definitions ↗Metal/nonmetal area field definitions ↗
EIA + TITLE 30
EIA production and cited regulations
EIA annual figures are reported separately from MSHA. Regulation links use the current eCFR snapshot.
Not present in the 2024 EIA coal workbook.
This can mean the operation is non-coal, inactive for the annual period, or outside the EIA-7A reporting population.
30 CFR 48.28Annual refresher training of miners; minimum courses of instruction; hours of instruction.4 recent rows ↗30 CFR 48.26Experienced miner training.1 recent row ↗30 CFR 77.410Mobile equipment; automatic warning devices.4 recent rows ↗30 CFR 77.1605Loading and haulage equipment; installations.2 recent rows ↗30 CFR 77.1000Highwalls, pits and spoil banks; plans.1 recent row ↗
RECENT PUBLIC RECORDS
Recent violations and samples
Latest records retained for inspection; aggregates above use the full source history.
724853748.28Citation
724853648.28Citation
724853548.28Citation
724853448.28Citation
723265148.26S&S
723459477.410(a)(1)S&S
723459377.410(a)(1)S&S
723459277.1605(d)Citation
Coal dust, noise and other contaminants. Silica records above ↑
Coal dustROAD GRADER OPERATOR
.393 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustHIGHLIFT OPERATOR/FRONT END LOADER
.126 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustCOAL TRUCK DRIVER
.224 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustBULLDOZER OPERATOR
.464 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustHIGHWALL DRILL OPERATOR
.533 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustREFUSE TRUCK DRIVER/BACKFILL TRUCK DRIVE
.119 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustHIGHLIFT OPERATOR/FRONT END LOADER
.211 mg/m³Not voided
Coal dustHIGHWALL DRILL OPERATOR
.669 mg/m³Not voided
SOURCE COVERAGE
Reporting dates and coverage
15 datasets contain linked records. Missing datasets are listed below.
DATASETROWSWINDOWSTATUS
Accident, Injuries, and Illnessessafety · contractors32Feb 6, 2002—Jan 27, 2006mine-keyed
Addresses of Recordidentity · logistics1Dec 1, 2006—Dec 1, 2006mine-keyed
Assessed Violationscompliance · legal100Mar 21, 2002—Jan 18, 2006mine-keyed
Civil Penalty Dockets and Decisionscompliance · legal—No published rowsabsent / not applicable
Coal Dust Sampleshealth · safety44Mar 26, 2002—Mar 23, 2006mine-keyed
Conferencescompliance · legal5Sep 21, 2004—Feb 22, 2006mine-keyed
Contested Violationscompliance · legal—No published rowsabsent / not applicable
Contractor Employment and Production — Quarterlycontractors · production · safety1,161Not published—Not publishedentity-linked
Contractor Employment and Production — Yearlycontractors · production · safety279Not published—Not publishedentity-linked
Controller and Operator Historyidentity · compliance13Jan 1, 1985—Sep 1, 2006mine-keyed
Mine Employment and Production — Quarterlyproduction · safety · compliance28Not published—Not publishedmine-keyed
Mine Employment and Production — Yearlyproduction · safety · compliance9Not published—Not publishedmine-keyed
Inspectionssafety · compliance40Dec 13, 2001—Oct 26, 2006mine-keyed
Minesidentity · production · logistics1Not published—Not publishedmine-keyed
Metal and Nonmetal Area Sampleshealth · safety—No published rowsabsent / not applicable
Metal and Nonmetal Personal Health Sampleshealth · safety—No published rowsabsent / not applicable
Noise Sampleshealth · safety · equipment5Mar 12, 2003—Mar 12, 2003mine-keyed
Quartz Samples — Coalhealth · safety2Aug 11, 2004—Mar 23, 2006mine-keyed
Violationscompliance · safety · legal105Mar 21, 2002—Jan 18, 2006mine-keyed
107(a) Orders Issuedsafety · compliance—No published rowsabsent / not applicable
NOTES
Limitations
- Contractor production is entity-level and is never represented as mine-attributable.
- Missing rows can mean no event, publication delay, identity mismatch, or inapplicability.