More than 100 miners with the McCoy Elkhorn Coal Company enhanced their skills by using some of the industry’s most state-of-the-art training tools aboard the Success Xpress, a mobile miner training unit built into a 53-foot truck trailer.

As Success Xpress concluded a two-week stay at McCoy Elkhorn’s Pike County mines, Safety Coordinator Gary Lockhart said he considers the training stop a great success for the miners and the company.

“The Success Xpress is just amazing,” Lockhart said. “It’s helping us get our younger miners trained, and trained the right way.

“What we do now with training will help us for a lifetime with our miners, and the Success Xpress is here to help us,” he added.

Many McCoy Elkhorn Coal miners came directly out of underground mines at the company’s Kimper and Harmon’s Branch operations and into the Success Xpress. Some spent time mining “virtual coal” with the facility’s three-dimensional computerized simulator, and others diagnosed and corrected simulated “faults” using the onboard electrical training panels.

The Success Xpress is owned and operated by the Eastern Kentucky Concentrated Employment Program (EKCEP), Inc., a nonprofit agency that administers workforce development programs in 23 eastern Kentucky counties.

Success Xpress is a key component in EKCEP's national award-winning Coal Services Program, which employs a variety of services to help address the workforce needs of eastern Kentucky's coal industry. EKCEP’s Coal Services Program was one of only five workforce programs from across the nation to receive 2007 Recognition of Excellence Awards from the U.S. Department of Labor. (To download and view USDOL's QuickTime video on EKCEP's Coal Services Program, right click this link, and select "Save Target As." To download a free version of QuickTime in order to view the video, click here.)

Chief Electrician Randall Meade said Success Xpress’ onboard Joy, Inc. electrical training panels are particularly useful to show trainees what occurs when a real continuous mining machine is in operation. Meade used the panels to simulate problems on the machinery that electricians and repairmen worked to “troubleshoot.”

“This is a good deal all around for training,” Meade said. “I like it.”

Numerous miners also operated Success Xpress’ continuous mining machine simulator, which they controlled with a hand-held panel exactly like the version on the machine’s real-life counterpart. The simulator includes a virtual reality headset that trainees wear to experience the sights and sounds of mining underground coal. Others in the class watch the operator’s progress on a 40-inch flat-screen display.

“If we’re training a person who has never been in the mines, (Success Xpress’) control panel can help them get used to the feel of the real thing because it works the same way,” Lockhart said.

Being able to train in a controlled environment that was delivered directly to the mine sites was very beneficial, he added.

“If our guys had to get off a shift and then go somewhere else for this training, I don’t know if they would have had a big interest in it,” Lockhart said. “But they’re able to come right out of the mines into (Success Xpress) during shift changes.”

The Success Xpress can be driven to remote coal mines, colleges, high schools, or any other location where training is needed. This mobility allows working miners like those with McCoy Elkhorn Coal to train on the Success Xpress at their work sites, reducing the impact of training on their companies’ productivity. It also allows high school students who are considering careers in coal to get a firsthand look at the high-tech nature of modern mining.

The Success Xpress makes the best possible training and instruction accessible to working miners and students at any location in the EKCEP service area, according to Crawford Blakeman, EKCEP Business Solutions manager.

“Wherever there’s a need at a coal mine for more skilled and better trained miners, Success Xpress will be ready to literally drive that training to their front door,” Blakeman said. “Being able to present this training in such a mobile way allows workers to train for advancement more efficiently with much less impact on company productivity.”

Success Xpress has trained working miners and students in Clay, Floyd, Harlan, Knott, Knox, Laurel, Lawrence, Letcher, Martin, Perry, and Pike counties. The Success Xpress has also visited the Kentucky Junior Coal Academy at Lawrence County High School and the Pike County Coal Academy at the Belfry Area Technology Center, allowing hundreds of high school students to spend time at the controls of the unit's continuous mining machine simulator.

During a two-week stop in Perry County, about 200 underground coal miners at the James River Coal Company's Leeco and Blue Diamond mines trained on Success Xpress. McCoy Elkhorn Coal is also a subsidiary of the James River Coal Company, which operates a total of six subsidiaries in eastern Kentucky and southern Indiana.

The Success Xpress was created with a portion of EKCEP’s share of a $3.1 million federal grant from the U.S. Department of Labor. The grant was awarded to EKCEP and the West Kentucky Workforce Investment Board (WKWIB) in December 2005 to train new miners and upgrade the skills of experienced miners in the state’s eastern and western coalfields. The grant was awarded under the President’s High Growth Job Training Initiative, as implemented by the Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration.

The Center for Rural Development is also a participating partner, designing and coordinating Success Xpress’ distance-learning technology.

For additional information on booking the Success Xpress for a visit to a mining operation, high school, vocational and technical school, or any other location, contact Crawford Blakeman at 606-436-5751.