April 11, 1913.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

757

first quarter of the present year was 18,028,401
tons, valued at £12,356,039, as against 13,123,527
tons, valued at £8,169,790, and 15,879,269 tons,
valued at £9,166,140, in the corresponding
periods respectively of 1912 and 1911.

Serious accidents occurred on Tuesday at
Tylorstown and Blaenavon. At the former
colliery four men have died as the result of a
heavy fall in the No. 8 pit, owned by Messrs.
D. Davis and Sons. At Blaenavon, three officials
—Arthur Tucker and Joseph Jenkins, under-
managers, and William Bond, examiner—lost
their lives through a fire in the workings of the
Big pit, five ponies being also killed. The
conflagration is said to have been caused by the
fusing of electric wires igniting timber.

Mr. W. Walker, divisional inspector of mines,
last week held the Home Office enquiry at
Mansfield into the causes of the Rufibrd pit
disaster.

The Royal Commission on Metalliferous Mines
and Quarries had their report under considera-
tion last week.

An advance proof of the statistics dealing with
work at mines and quarries during 1912 shows
that the output of coal from mines under the
Coal Mines Act was 260,567,552 tons, as
compared with 271,878,124 tons in 1911. The
actual falling off in production is, however,
somewhat less than the figures indicate. In
previous years some owners have been in the
habit of returning the gross weight sent out of
the pit including dirt; this year the net output
of coal has been returned by these owners, who
estimate that the amount of dirt which would
have been included if the returns had been
made in the same way as in previous years was
2,279,789 tons. The actual falling off, therefore,
of output is 9,012,783 tons. In all the districts
there was a decline, with the exception of South
Wales, where there was an increase of 67,196
tons. The decreases were as follow:—New-
castle, 2,348,747 tons; Durham, 1,916,142 tons?
Scotland, 1,685,970 tons; York and North
Midland, 1,620,793 tons; Midland and Southern,
547,242 tons; Manchester and Ireland, 497,682
tons; Liverpool and North Wales, 463,403 tons.
The number of persons employed at mines
under the Coal Mines Act was 1,089,165, an
increase of 21,952. The decrease in the output
of coal is at the rate of 3’32 per cent.; and the
increase in the number of persons employed at
mines under the Coal Mines Act is at, the rate of
2 06 per cent.

The general secretary (Mr. T. Richards, M.P.)
has issued a circular to the members of the South
Wales Miners’ Federation intimating that May L
Labour Day, is to be observed as a general
holiday by all colliery workmen throughout the
coalfields, and before that date all workmen are
expected to become members of the Federation.

A resolution, proposed by Mr. Crooks in the
House of Commons on Wednesday, to establish
a universal minimum wage on the basis of 30s.
per week for urban workers was talked out.
Mr. Craig, the coalowner who represents Crewe,
made an effective maiden speech, in which he
declared that the Eight Hours, Minimum Wage,
and National Insurance Acts had increased the
cost of production by Is. 6d. per ton

The report of the “ Squibs ” Committee was
published on Thursday. The committee consider
that the use of squibs, properly constructed and
legitimately used, for the purpose of firing shots
in naked light mines is not attended with
such special danger as to make it desirable to
prohibit them. Certain special conditions as to
manufacture and use are suggested.

We understand that negotiations have now
reached a stage which makes it probable that it

will be unnecessary to go before a Referee on
the Draft General Regulations. A conference
was held on Wednesday and Thursday, at which
many of the differences were settled.

Some 5,000 miners struck work this week in
the Cannock Chase and Pelsall districts on the
non-unionist question. By Thursday a con-
siderable proportion had returned to work. The
South Staffs enginemen are threatening to hand
in notices.

Several enquiries for coal have been received
in South Wales and the North of England in
anticipation of the general strike of Belgian
workmen on the suffrage question, which, it is
threatened, will take place on Monday next.

Mr. J. Drummond Paton, at a meeting of the
Manchester Geological and Mining Society on
Tuesday, read a paper on “ Small Coal and Dust:
Production, Prevention, Treatment and Utilisa-
tion (with Special Reference to Dry Mines).”

Flogging for pit lads guilty of cruelty to
ponies in mines was vetoed by the Notts Quarter
Sessions this week.

A meeting of the North of England Institute
will be held to-morrow in Newcastle, when the
president (Mr. W. C. Blackett) will deliver an
address. The 36th annual meeting of the
Mining Institute of Scotland will be held in
Glasgow on the same day. The committee
appointed to investigate the means of testing
firedamp and blackdamp by a safety lamp will
present their report and papers on underground
fires, and fan-testing will be read by Messrs.
Rowan and Watson respectively.

The Home Secretary announces that on April I
he made general regulations under sections 57
and 86 of the Coal Mines Act (1911) as to the
hours of employment of winding enginemen, and
that he has prescribed June 30 next as the
date after which, under the Act, a winding
engineman may not be employed for more than
eight hours in any one day, except as provided
by the general regulations.

A deputation from the Parliamentary Com-
mittee of the Trades Union Congress waited
upon Mr, McKenna on Tuesday in regard to
certain questions, but the Home Secretary gave
no prospect of legislation.

The new United States Tariff Bill involves
the removal of all duties on food and clothing,
and broad reductions on many raw materials.
Thus it is proposed to place coal, iron ore, steel
rails, nails, hoop and band iron amongst a
number of other commodities, upon the free list,
whilst the rates on pig iron, beams and forgings,
sheets and tin-plates, steam engines, &c., are
reduced to about half their present figures.

Last week the House of Lords reversed the
decision of the Scottish Court of Session in the
appeal of the Lochgelly Iron and Coal Company
v. the North British Railway, which raised the
question of the interpretation of the “Burntisland
agreement,” made in 1896 between the railway
company and a number of Fifeshire coalmasters.
The decision of the House of Lords, in effect,
declares that the railway company are not
entitled to increase the inward charges on
pitwood or the outward charges on coal at
Burntisland or Methil, so as to confer a commer-
cial advantage on traders using the ports of
Grangemouth and Bo’ness.

We understand that a movement is on foot to
recognise the great services rendered by Prof.
W. Galloway to the coal industry by his
researches into the part played by coaldust in
colliery explosions. It is proposed to form a
committee for the purpose, comprising repre-
sentatives of the various coalowners’ associations,
and the learned and scientific institutions
interested in the coalmining industry.

There is a persistent impression
Prevention pervading the public mind that
of the principal risk encountered
Accidents, by the coalminer is due to explo-
sions of firedamp and coaldust.
That this impression is fallacious is readily seen
by referring to statistics. For instance, during
the year 1911, at mines under the Coal Mines
Regulation Act, there were 1,181 separate fatal
accidents causing 1,232 deaths (the average for
the preceding five years having been 1,134 acci-
dents and 1,359 deaths), out of which 22 accidents
causing 34 deaths were caused by explosions of
firedamp or coaldust (the corresponding average
figures for the preceding five years were
17*4 accidents and 188*6 deaths). In 1911 there
were, therefore, 1,159 accidents due to other
causes, resulting in the loss of 1,198 lives (the
corresponding average figures for the preceding
five years having been 1,116*6 accidents and
l,160‘4 deaths).

The fallacy becomes still more apparent when
we compare the figures for non-fatal accidents.
During the same year, 1911, the number of non-
fatal accidents, disabling the persons injured for
more than seven days, at all mines under the
Coal Mines Regulation Act, was 163,437, causing
injury to 163,885 persons, out of which only 105
accidents, causing injury to 165 persons, were
due to explosions of firedamp or coaldust. The
corresponding average figures for the preceding
five years were 155,728 and 98 accidents, and
156,199 and 155 persons injured respectively.

Under the heading “ Colliery Accidents,” and
elsewhere in to-day’s issue, records or references
are given to six recent accidents—and two others
will be referred to later—causing the death of
27 persons, none of which accidents was due to an
explosion. On February 7, at the Rufibrd pit, near
Mansfield, an accident occurred in the course of
sinking a shaft, when 14 persons were killed, and
four injured, through a water barrel being over-
wound, which fell to the bottom of the shaft.
On April 3 a shaft accident occurred at the Cause-
way pit, Himley Colliery, when two persons were
killed in consequence of the collapse of scaffolds.
One person was killed at Lassodie Mill Colliery
by a burst of coal from the working face.
During the present week five accidents have
occurred, causing a death roll of ten persons :—
Big Pit, near Pontypool, three persons killed
(two under-managers and one fireman), conse-
quent upon timber catching fire, possibly by the
fusing of an electric wire. No. 8 Pit, Tylors-
town, Rhondda Valley, four persons killed by a
fall of roof. Ardley Colliery, Stevenston,
Ayrshire, one person killed through falling down
the shaft. Kelloe Colliery, Coxhoe, Durham,
one person killed by something falling upon
him while in the shaft. New London Colliery,
Eastwood, one person killed by electric shock.
Following the classification of the Home Office,
these accidents would be recorded as :—Falls of
ground, two ; shaft accidents four; miscellaneous,
two; causing a total loss of 27 lives.

It was with a view to the prevention of such
accidents that the General Rules and the Codes
of Special Rules were introduced into coalmining
legislation. It is recorded in the Second Report
of the Royal Commission on Mines, that a
Select Committee of the House of Commons
was appointed in June 1853, to enquire into the
causes of the numerous accidents in coalmines.
Early in 1854, at the suggestion of the Com-
mittee, a meeting of colliery owners, colliery
viewers, Government inspectors and delegates of
the workmen was convened to discuss the best
means of preventing accidents, and they passed
a number of resolutions, among which was the
following:—