Buffalo Creek Disaster

Buffalo Creek Disaster In February of 1972, sixteen small working class towns in West Virginia were flooded not just with water but with black sludge waste material from a local coal mining operation. The flood caused the immediate deaths of 125 people, many of whom were women and children who were not even employees of the coal industry. Scarring the region and leaving over a thousand people without homes, the Buffalo Creek disaster consisted of 130 million gallons of hazardous waste material and water, which created tidal waves up to thirty feet high.

Buffalo Creek rests in a seventeen mile valley located in Logan County, West Virginia. The region was home to Pittston, a New York-based coal mining company and one of the largest employers in the area. The Buffalo Creek disaster resulted from the failure of one of Pittston's refuse dams; when the dam collapsed, it unleashed the horrendous and deadly flow of water and waste throughout the area. The environmental damages are probably still observable, the psychological and physical scars on its victims still palpable decades later.

Although they were essentially powerless in the face of corporate power and influence, over a hundred of the survivors of the Buffalo Creek disaster bonded together to file a high-profile lawsuit against the perpetrators of the incident. Unwilling to accept the trite response by Pittston that the flood was nothing more than an "act of God," the residents of Logan County assumed an assertive, determined stance against corporate corruption in the landmark case described in the book Buffalo Creek Disaster.

Written by the presiding attorney in the lawsuit, the book is attorney Gerald Stern's recounting of the proceedings and events of the case and incorporates the author's personal impressions with his accessible yet thorough explanation of the legal proceedings. Public interest partner in the prestigious Washington, DC law firm Arnold and Porter, Stern had no prior experience with similar cases.

The closest Stern came to working on a case such as this was in his work in the Deep South with voting discrimination against African-Americans in the 1960s, in the heat of the Civil Rights movement. The author alludes to his past to underscore the nature of the Buffalo Creek disaster as being essentially about underdogs prevailing over an overly powerful corporate structure in America.

In many ways, the Buffalo Creek case illustrates that through perseverance and good legal counsel, the small person can indeed win decisive legal victories, even if the root causes of the problem have yet to be addressed. In the end, the plaintiffs received a total of $13.5 million, which Stern notes was "much more than we ever expected," even though the initial demand was $32.5 million (269).

Although the case never went to trial, the Buffalo Creek disaster nevertheless makes an interesting expose on the workings of the American civil justice system in dealing with cases of corporate neglect or abuse of power. At first, Stern started high, aiming for criminal charges to be filed against Pittston as well as claiming over $30 million in collective damages (punitive and psychological), and individual property claims.

The figures were pulled out of the air in large part to the inability of anyone to place monetary values on personal possessions that hold more sentimental than material worth. For instance, in the chapter entitled "They Wasn't for Sale," one of the plaintiffs and victims of the disaster notes that the defendant cannot possibly attempt to place a value on a special tree that flanked his yard. Calling the Buffalo Creek disaster an "act of God" was, according to Stern, "A public relations blunder," (11).

That, along with a report issued by an ad hoc commission of inquiry into the incident by the state claiming Pittston was guilty of "flagrant disregard" placed public opinion squarely on the side of the plaintiffs. However, as Stern emphasizes, lawsuits cannot be tried in the press, and Stern did his utmost to remain ethical in his proceedings.

He admits he was "a little nervous" when the case first began," as he had never encountered anything quite like it, but in the end succeeded due to sound legal strategy and patience. The case took years to be resolved and Stern went through numerous depositions as well as a number of failed settlement attempts. Stern struggled with several pressing strategic questions throughout the case.

For example, at first he had to decide who to sue exactly: the Buffalo Mining Company, owner of the dam itself, or Pittston, the sole shareholder in the Buffalo Mining Company and the real brain behind the disaster. Moreover, Stern had.