Familes of Sudbury miners speak of loss – by Jonathan Migneault (Sudbury Star – September 18, 2013)

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

After his younger brother Jordan Fram was killed in a was killed in a run of muck in the Stobie Mine in 2011, Jesse Fram continued to call his phone for months, just so he could hear Jordan’s voice when he was prompted to leave a message.

Fram was amongst several family members who gave emotional victim impact statements in a Greater Sudbury courtroom Tuesday.

Jordan’s employer, Vale Canada Limited, pleaded guilty to three charges under the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act in relation to the events that lead to his death.

The last time Wendy Fram spoke to her youngest son, she told him to be safe before he left for work. That night, on June 8, 2011, Jordan Fram, 26, and Jason Chenier, 35, were crushed by 350 tons of muck at the 3,000-foot level of the Stobie Mine.

Vale was fined $350,000 for each of the three counts, which were related to a failure to take reasonable precautions to prevent water accumulation in the mine. That failure caused the run of muck that killed Fram and Chenier. The total fine of $1.050 million was the largest ever awarded in Ontario for a health and safety prosecution.

“He had so much love in his heart,” Wendy Fram said about Jordan, as she tried to fight back tears. She said the passage of time has not made the loss of her son any easier to bear. “We will never get to see him get married or be grandparents to his children,” she said.

Fram’s younger sister, Briana Fram, said she has needed professional counselling to deal with the emotional toll of his death. She said her last birthday, just days before the anniversary of his death, was particularly difficult because she was now 27, a year older than Jordan was when he died underground.

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