THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN

AND

JOURNAL OF THE COAL AND IRON TRADES.

Vol. CVII.	FRIDAY, MAY 1, 1914.	No. 2783.

Reports on the Senghenydd Explosion.

The Home Secretary has issued the reports on the
causes of and circumstances attending the explosion
which occurred at the Senghenydd Colliery on Tuesday,
October 14, 1913, by Messrs. R. A. S. Redmayne, C.B.,
H.M. Chief Inspector of Mines (Commissioner), Evan
Williams, chairman of the South Wales and Mon-

died from the effects of the afterdamp was 439, and one
man lost his life on the day following the explosion
whilst engaged in work at the fire on the main west
level, being killed by a fall of stone. The hearing of
evidence at the enquiry alone occupied 13 days, during
which time 21,837 questions were put to witnesses.

the east side. The seam being worked on the west side
is the Four-feet, those worked on the east side are the
Four-feet, the Universal, and the Nine-feet, but all
these workings are connected to one level by means of
drifts. The explosion of October 14, 1913, was confined
to the west side, which is divided into six districts, viz.,
the West York, Pretoria, Mafeking, Kimberley, Lady-
smith and Bottanic, all of which branch away from the
main intake known as the main west level. They were
not ventilating districts in the sense that each was

B

B

Bl

Heavy fall of roof and

B

.ABC

B

BC.

B

District

Mafeking

B

D

c

0

West York District.

B.C:

Fig. 1.—Plan of West Side Workings, Senghenydd Colliery.

A
C/

*

Blast Pipes shewn Thus.

Water Pipes , ,	, ,

Signalling Wires	, ,

C
aA

/ o

LvQj

B.CJ

lli BULLS PARTING
C If damp

i

k p Place where Jhomas Jones
was working in the 9' O' dp~y^.

Pretoria District. \

iA.BC- I

J Lairp . I

KjjgjSjatiGnJ	B

/ Bashing

asML. .putrn

CZ	'

Lancaster Pit (downcast,

Scale (approximate), 284 yards to an inch.

A = bodies burnt; B = bodies suffocated ; C = bodies burnt and suffocated; D — engines.



















mouthshire Coalowners’ Association, and Robert Smillie,
president of the Miners’ Federation of Great Britain
(Assessors).

A brief summary of the reports appeared in last
week’s Colliery Guardian, and we now give further
extracts.

The explosion, which in point of loss of life constitutes
the greatest disaster in the annals of British mining,
happened at about 8.10 a.m. on Tuesday, October 14.
The number of persons killed by the explosion or who

The Chief Inspector’s Report.

Mr. Redmayne, at the outset 6f his report, gives a
description of the colliery and an outline of its history,
which once before, on May 21, 1901, was the scene of a
disastrous explosion, by which 81 persons lost their
lives, devastating the whole of the mine, only one man
being saved alive.

The seams worked are the Four-feet, the Universal
and the Nine-feet. The underground workings are
divided into two main divisions, viz., the west side and

ventilated by a split from a main intake airway, nor
were they separate inspection districts, for they were
either further subdivided or added to for this purpose.
The arrangement of the districts is shown in fig. 1.

The output of coal was about 1,800 tons per diem, the
coal being filled into wagons or trams of the common
Welsh type, that is, open at each end but for a bar, the
coal being piled up well above the tops of the trams.
The main haulage from the Mafeking, West York,
Bottanic, and part of the No. 2 South (Pretoria) dis-