MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) — Nike has replaced the image of a strip mine with that of a football stadium in ads promoting a new West Virginia University football uniform.
Nike decided Thursday to revise the ad after environmentalists complained about the depiction of a mountaintop removal mine behind the image of a uniform intended to honor 29 men killed in the Upper Big Branch mine blast.
That mine was an underground operation.
Activists said they didn’t object to the actual uniform, but that the ad appeared to be a tacit endorsement of mountaintop removal by both Nike and the university.
Both insisted that wasn’t their intention.
Nike says it designed the black and white uniforms as a tribute to the state’s coal mining heritage.
