They've had too much time to sit in their homes - Steve in Cleveland, Frank in the Miller Creek area south of Price - and dwell on the loss of their brother, Kerry, last Aug. 6 in the Crandall Canyon mine.
And of their second cousin, Dale Black, one of three rescuers who died 10 days later in a second implosion of the mine's walls.
To make matters worse, the disaster has deepened a generation-old estrangement from two other distant cousins, brothers Benny and Bodee Allred, who were mid-level bosses at the mine. Benny was the foreman over Kerry's crew. Bodee was Crandall Canyon's safety director.
Even the recent release of the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration's official disaster investigation report did not help that much.
"Kinda, sorta," said Frank, thankful for a few concrete answers to his questions about what happened, but still not satisfied he has a full explanation of why.
Same for Steve.
"The fact it said it was poor mining practices; I knew that as soon as I saw the [mine] map the day it happened," said Steve, who mined coal for 27 years before back injuries left him disabled and nearly constantly uncomfortable.
But the report did little to relieve what he described earlier as "an absolute sense of helplessness. You can't believe anything you hear and only half of what you see. That's where I am with [mining company owner] Bob Murray and with MSHA."
It doesn't help either brother that Kerry's body was never recovered from the mine.
"I'd like to see those boys get out of there," said Frank, a retired farmer, noting that even if East Mountain is "one of the prettiest cemeteries in the state, I can't help seeing those bodies in that cold, dark hole."
Not wanting to fixate on an image like that, Frank and his wife Nancy have focused elsewhere.
Nancy has created a thick binder filled with articles about Kerry and the disaster. The collection includes a poem she recited at a memorial service in Huntington in September and a drawing by her 5-year-old granddaughter, Tennysen, showing two rescuers and a drill within the arc of a rainbow.
Frank also clings to the only three pictures he has left of his brother, all other family photos having been ruined years ago when his first house flooded. Still, these are enough to stir pleasant memories of Kerry - playing the guitar, working on old cars, camping at his favored "pretty little spot" on Cedar Mountain, drinking a beer or smoking a cigarette, reciting the little sayings that frequently rolled off his tongue.
"He always used the phrases 'my friend' and 'you take care' or 'back at you.' He had all kinds of sayings," Frank said.
Steve and his wife, Ginger, have sought solace in similar ways while caring for Steve's 83-year-old mother, Agnes.
He was able to express some of his frustration last fall in an appearance before a congressional committee, an experience he never could have fathomed just months earlier.
If nothing else, Steve said, "my mind-set is to make sure nothing like this ever happens again . . . I'd love to have a grave to go to and talk to my brother, but the priority now is that they learn from what happened at Crandall Canyon."
mikeg@sltrib.com
