The former Upper Big Branch Mine superintendent testified this afternoon that the company added staff to clean up safety violations only after Massey Energy faced potential shutdowns under a tougher federal government enforcement action.

Rick Hodge told jurors that Massey also stopped producing coal on Saturdays to do more maintenance and try to avoid having Upper Big Branch put on the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration’s pattern of violation status.

An additional crew was also hired to better rock dust the mine, Hodge said. “The violations went down and actually the mine looked pretty good.”

Hodge said after UBB was removed from the list of mines being considered for POV status that all changed.

“We went back to running coal on Saturdays,” Hodge said. “The one rock dusting crew was taken away.”

On cross examination by Blankenship defense lawyer Blair Brown, Hodge said he was brought into UBB to try to improve conditions at the mine.

MSHA warned in December 2007 the mine could end up on the POV list if it didn’t improve. By March 2008, things had improved enough that MSHA removed UBB from the list.

Hodge said he left in July 2008 and that he did not believe the mine’s safety performance deteriorated in that time.

“I thought the mine looked good in my opinion” Hodge said.

Brown asked Hodge if it would ever be possible for a coal mine to have no serious violations.

“It’s not impossible but it would be hard to do,” Hodge said.