mits or social regulations break down, the controlling authority the society once had no longer functions and people are left on their own to make their own plans. In societies that have low levels of social regulations, a state of Anomie, or normlessness, can occur and affect the whole society or just some of its groups. Anomic suicide was more prevalent in this type of society. Anomic suicide basically involves an imbalance of means and needs, where the means were unable to fulfill the needs. It is also typified by a condition in which an individual's desire is no longer in harmony with the norm and where, as a result, people are left without any moral guidance in the pursuit of their goals. Finally, we have Fatalistic suicide, which occurs in societies with high levels of social regulation. This is only briefly discussed in Durkheim's work, as he saw Fatalistic suicide, "as a rare phenomena in the real world."" (I1) An example might be someone with an overregulated and difficult life, like a slave.
             In order to understand how Durkheim's concepts apply to the Buffalo Creek disaster, you must first know some things about Buffalo Creek, West Virginia. Prior to the disaster in 1972, Buffalo Creek was a typical coal mining community, home to some five thousand people. It had changed over the years, population rose and fell with the periodic coal booms, the population had actually risen to two or three times its present size in 1972. Most of the people who came and left were mainly temporary, just f
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