January 18, 2020 - 'Mine 9.' an award winning film written, produced and directed by New Martinsville native Eddie Mensore was released for streaming on January 7, in stores and on DVD, while also hitting the screen on Amazon Prime.Firm Operations

The movie which made it's debut on Friday, April 8, 2019, opening in several states to sell out audiences, and soon became the top movie most in appalacia wanted to see.

'Mine 9,'is a intense thriller about a coal mine entrapment filmed in real coal country. The film takes place deep inside a coal mine where nine miners with a limited oxygen supply are trapped after a methane explosion.

"Nobody has ever made this movie," Mensore said. "That was really the inspiration," along with real-life tragedies while growing up that "shook our state."

West Virginia has seen its share.In 2010, 29 men died in an explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in southern West Virginia.

In 2006, a methane gas explosion at the Sago Mine in northern West Virginia killed 12 miners. Another miner survived. Later that year, five miners were killed in an explosion at a mine in Harlan County, Kentucky.

The worst mining disaster in U.S. history occurred in December 1907 when 362 died in an explosion at a coal mine in Monongah, West Virginia. Mensore said the film isn't based on a particular event, but "we had to make it as realistic as possible."

The story itself highlights the dangers that many working in the mines today still experience. The theme of the film is one miners of coal producing states know all to well. An entrapment inside an Appalacian Coal Mine.

Eddie Mensore's "Mine 9," about a group of coal miners trying to survive a cave-in, brought on by a massive methane gas explosion. Although the miners were aware of high levels of methane, they continued to put their lives on the line daily to keep food on the table. Their rule of thumb is it's better to have a paycheck then be on the unemployment line.

This is a great opportunity for those living in the region and around the globe to actually see what it's like to go underground on a daily basis.

The movie is a survival drama centered on a fictional coal mine explosion in Appalachia, Writer-director-producer Eddie Mensore, mixes the dramatics of a disaster movie, while treating its male characters as heroes and victims in equal measure. Mensore spent litterally years working on the film to give dedicated hard hit coal mining communities a film aimed cheifly at highlighting the dangers America's hard working men and women face while working under undue stress in the Nations coal mines.

Mensore's film aims chiefly to highlight the typical plight of an American working class that rarely gets big-screen attention. That it does with honesty and conviction, if not a great deal of inspiration.

Wetzel Chronicle Sports Writer Bruce Crawford and myself have a combined total of nearly 55 years of underground mining experience and we both had the opportunity to view the film at it's early release in theaters. We believe the film to be acturate and a near real life experience.

Eddie Mensore did an excellent job of capturing the everyday life of modern day mining.