Judge pares fine over deaths after hearing about UK Coal’s dire finances

The UK Daily Record reports a judge hearing how four miners died following safety breaches in 2006 and 2007 at Britain’s biggest mining firm – UK Coal – has indicated he will not impose fines at a level which would “cripple” a company which in court was described as being in a “pretty desperate situation”.

UK Coal is a shadow of its former self – in May 2008 it was trading at £5.84 while on Thursday in London trade the company exchanged hands for 34p giving it a market capitalization of not much more than £100 million.

At the end of September two workers were reported trapped at Kellingley colliery in Yorkshire, UK Coal’s last remaining deep mine in the county. One later died. Reuters reported that incident came less than a month after four miners died after a flash flood inside a small privately-run coal mine in south Wales, one of the worst mining accidents in Britain in many years.

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