Pittston's Reputation: The Buffalo Creek Disaster

Gerald M. Stern’s novel, The Buffalo Creek Disaster, helps students better understand the civil procedure process by describing the process through an actual case Stern himself litigated. The case began in 1972 after a dam collapsed in Buffalo Creek, West Virginia, killing 125 people and destroying many homes. Other than property damage and loss of loved ones, those who survived suffered what Stern referred to as psychic impairment, or mental suffering. Stern’s lawsuit involved 625 plaintiffs suing the Pittston Coal Group, or the stockholder of the Buffalo Mining Company, for compensatory and punitive damages. Stern had to choose a court and a judge, decide how much relief the plaintiffs were seeking, depose witnesses, and work with the defendant’s counsel

The Penn State scandal affected many people. Many who worked for the University and many who weren’t affiliated with the college at all. All of the individuals affected by the incident are considered to be stakeholders. Although this incident impacted many individuals across the nation, the University resides in Pennsylvania, and the stakeholders include employees of the college, customers who attend various events at the college and the community it resides in (Crandall, Parnell, & Spillan, 2014). Even though all of these individuals are considered stakeholders, they can be placed in two different categories that consist of internal stakeholders and external stakeholders (Crandall et al., 2014). The internal stakeholders are individuals that

Our journal for the third week of class was to watch the movie A Civil Action, since we would not be in class. This movie was interesting because Jan Schlichtmann who was originally a greedy personal injury lawyer decides to take on case due to the potentially large settlement involved. Unfortunately, the case eventually bankrupted him and his staff. At the end of the movie, the viewer is able to see that he did not continue the case for the money once he began understand the entire situation. This movie chronicled the progression of Schlichtmann accepting the case to becoming broke. Because the movie carefully showed the underlying issues of water contamination in Woburn, Michigan. This allowed the viewer to understand that there is a fair amount of meetings and negotiations that happen behind the scenes in the legal system. Despite the fact that he was a talented lawyer who could negotiate. It was awfully apparent that in the short term the legal team with the most money and power would win the case, but not in the long run. When Schlichtmann decided to hand the case to the EPA they were able to out power and outspend Beatrice foods, Riley Tannery and chemical company W.R Grace; the companies involved in the water contamination issue.

The most important aspect in managing a disaster situation is preparedness. The simulation Disaster in Franklin County highlights the role of public health personnel, with emphasis on the public health nurse because the nurse is often a first responder to such a disaster. This helps to examine the roles, actions, coping methods, and techniques used by a nurse in a disaster scenario.

In this short essay, the author will critically review Gerald M. Stern's The Buffalo Creek Disaster in terms of critiquing the author's thesis, supporting arguments, supporting evidence and authority, style, and content. It will also place the work in the context of the larger debate about the relationship between law and business. It is the position of this author that Mr. Sterns' position is correct and this position will be supported in the essay.

Communities that was adjacent to Buffalo Creek. When operation of the mine commenced in 1945 the practice dumping of slurry or coal mining waste into the hollow also began. Coal companies who operated upstream of the communities dammed Buffalo Creek to facilitate mining operations, which created an earth dam that held back 130 million gallons of water and coal waste. On average, a thousand tons of slurry had to be dumped every day. Although there were many complaints about the safety of the coal company and its regulation of the Buffalo Creek site, nothing was ever done to improve the dam’s conditions. The Buffalo Creek project had three earth dams ranging in

The Plaintiffs, Garetsons, own a well in Haskell County, which they use for irrigation pursuant to a vested water right. The Defendant, American Warrior Inc. (AWI), owns two nearby wells with junior water appropriation rights. Garetsons sued AWI requesting an injunction to prevent AWI from pumping groundwater. The District Court found that AWI’s wells were causing significant impairment and drawdown of the Garetsons’ water rights. As a result, tThe District Court granted an

First, the “un-engineered” dam violated two laws; second, Pittston knew the dam was not safe; third, Pittston did not have a warning system in place to alert residents in case of disaster; fourth, by convincing the deputies to discontinue their warning efforts, Pittston negated the last-ditch effort that could have saved 125 people (Nugent 183). The most tragic finding from the multiple investigations and studies is that Pittston could have built a safe dam for less than 200,000 thousand dollars, an amount that was a mere “one-half of one percent of its 1971 profits” (Nugent 184), a small sacrifice that could have saved many lives. Pittston’s culpability lies in its reckless greed. One of saddest reminders of the horror of Pittston’s wanton disregard is a tombstone that reads: “This Tiny Trio / Boy-Girl-Boy / Who were the Victims of the Feb. 26, 1972 Buffalo Creek Disaster are unknown to us by name but to Our Heavenly Father they are known as three little angels” (Stern 47). The article Remembering Buffalo Creek, 40 Years Later commemorates the tragedy saying: “We have a responsibility to teach each future generation what happened and why, so that they cannot only reverently remember but make certain that history does not repeat itself” (1). One can hope all companies have this etched in their minds and hearts and souls when they think of sacrificing safety for a

On August 20th, 1955, President Dwight Eisenhower declared Connecticut a disaster area, due to major flooding from both Hurricane Connie on August 11 and Hurricane Diane on the 17th. Sixty-seven towns experienced flooding prompting residents to banned together to save their community and homes. Considered by many to be the most tragic events in the history of Connecticut, it also brought the necessary public awareness to the danger of floods and what can cause them. The devastation caused by Connie and Diane awakened forecasters, politicians, and regional planners. "A week after the now-named Hurricane Floods of 1955, the Weather Bureau acknowledged the need to upgrade their flashflood warning system. Levees and other flood protection measures

As the shareholder of Samarco, the disaster damaged BHP 's reputation and benefits. BHP needs to prepare huge funds for the clean-up bill, potential fines and compensation for those injured or killed people. In stock market, BHP took a beating in trade after the disaster. BHP fell 5.7 per cent in London and grappled with the lowest iron prices in a decade. The exact cause of the burst dam is unclear because the investigation is still continuing. However, a 2013 assessment by the independent Brazilian organisation highlighted concerns about the integrity of the tailings dam and recommended against renewing the licence which was ignored by Samarco (Ricardo, 2016). people have doubted that whether other tailings dams of BHP around the world is structurally sound and raised eyebrows about how they manage the risks at other operations. The disaster raised the suspicion of dependability of tailings dams at other mines owned by BHP. Besides, this disaster reminded people of past failures including the collapse of the BHP Ok Tedi tailings dam in the late of 20st century which is also considered as one of the worst environmental disaster (3). More and more people begin to criticize the operation way of BHP and lose the confidence for BHP due to their failure of diligence responsibilities. The following paragraph on this essay will discuss and analyze whether BHP’s behaviour is ethical or unethical through shareholder and stakeholder theories.

Balch Creek begins in the Forest Park neighborhood in unincorporated Multnomah County near the intersection of Northwest Skyline Boulevard and Northwest Thompson Road at the crest of the West Hills. It flows generally east about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) to its confluence with the Willamette River, a major tributary of the Columbia River.[4] The creek drops from 1,116 feet (340 m) above sea level at its source to 46 feet (14 m) at its mouth, a total of 1,070 feet (330 m).[1][2] Most of this occurs in the first 2.5 miles (4.0 km). In the hills, the stream gradient (slope) generally ranges from 15 to 30 percent interspersed with sections of less than 15 percent along the middle reaches.[9]

Enron was named the most admired company for six years in a row, and it was widely considered one of the best companies to work for by Fortune magazine. Enron shocked the world, and it's stockholders when it was revealed at the end of 2001 that the company’s “reported financial condition was sustained substantially by institutionalized, systematic, and creatively planned accounting fraud”. (Enron, 2011, para. 1) Enron maximized it’s long-run profits for itself, but not within the limits of the law. Enron disregarded it’s social responsibility to it’s stackholders when the company only strive for it’s maximized profits, and didn’t strive

An effective corporate governance regime includes prosecution for individuals who conduct unethical or illegal acts in the name of the enterprise [4]. Why so that there were no discussions in regards to the person/s responsible for dumping pollutants in the adjacent stream? Wasn’t the disposal unethical enough to violate the name of the enterprise? The management’s failure to recognize that such action ruins the reputation of the company is ineffective itself.

In an increasingly disintermediated information world, keeping a decent corporate reputation is more challenging than ever. The speed knowledge of spreads and our greater access to a wider media means "big bad news" easily gets to your phone in the space of your homeward journey (Grossman). Even though this is a nonprofit organization, it is run like a corporation. Just like a corporation, this organization has to keep up its image. Image management and finical performance have been closely related. Reputation is conceptualized by means of a two-dimensional

Natural disasters have never been an issue for me in the twenty years I have been living in Florida. There have always been the threats of dangerous hurricanes living near the coast, but I never took them seriously. I always thought " they're just little storms, what's the worst that could happen?". I was so naive to think that way.