1148

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

June 16, 1916.

PICKING MEH FOR MINE RESCUE
TRAINING *

By L. Keating.

Not every man selected to take a course in mine
rescue training given by the company is fit to undergo
a. rigorous course of instruction. Rejected candi-
dates are numerous, and the time and money spent on
training an unfit applicant can easily be saved if the
selection were made more carefully.

On account of the hazardous nature of mine rescue
work, careful training in the use of the oxygen helmet
and rescue apparatus is indispensable. None but the
most reliable sort of men with good health, sound
bodies, and steady nerves should be permitted to- under-
take it.

It must be borne in mind that mine rescue and first-
aid training are entirely separate subjects. Indeed,
in the work itself, there is very little, if any, com-
parison. Every first-class mine rescue man can be a
good first-aid student; but it does not follow that every
man schooled in first-aid can perform the perilous duties
of mine rescue work.

The qualifications of a desirable candidate for mine
rescue training may be divided under two main general
heads, namely, mental and physical requirements.

Mental Requirements.

The standard of mental requirements docs not neces-
sarily demand that the candidate should have had a
college or even a high school education. But he posi-
tively must be able to read and write and speak the
English language. Foreigners are liable to misunder-
stand the simple verbal instructions regarding the hand-
ling of the apparatus, and thereby suffer serious conse-
quences at a critical moment. Training in mine rescue
work should not be required to include a course of
instruction in English.

Candidates should be selected for their thorough
acquaintance with the underground workings. They
should know the mine from shaft to sump, every cross
road and gangway, every slope and manway, the
approach to every chamber and cross-cut, the direction
and volume of the air currents, the location of the
underground hospitals, and all the peculiarities of the
local conditions.

A mine rescue man should know a little about all the
various occupations in the mine, for in an emergency,
and under trying circumstances, he may be required to
do almost anything : cutting coal, standing props, build-
ing brattices and regulators, or even man the pumps and
the engines. He should be courageous and a volunteer.
No man srould be coerced into mine rescue training.

He should have a sound, sober, and steady head,
steady nerves, clear faculties, good judgment, and be
able to move about in dangerous atmosphere with cool-
ness and precision. There is no use wasting time train-
ing a. man with a fickle mind or a flighty, frivolous
temperament; such men are usually cowards, easily
excited, and lack solid determination. They are
dangerously unreliable when their services are most
needed.

Physical Requirements.

The physical requirements are also extremely impor-
tant. No man should be entrusted with his own life,
let alone to attempt to rescue others when he is locked
up in a helmet, if he is asthmatic, or if his lungs are
not in perfect condition. He may require more air
than the oxygen apparatus can supply, and is thus liable
to be suffocated. Men who indulge in intoxicating
liquors will be rejected without any further examina-
tion. The oxygen helmet will soon tell a man who
drinks how utterly useless he is. In five minutes a
drinker will gasp for air. The habitual use of alcohol
has so weakened his system that he can do no useful
work in rescue apparatus, so easily is he fatigued. Every
man picked for training in mine rescue work should have
good eyes, two good arms and legs, and a good stomach;
in fact, he should be physically perfect, and any dis-
ability whatever will be sufficient cause for his rejection.

Now, even though a man may be physically perfect,
it does not necessarily follow that he will be a suitable
candidate for mine rescue work, or that he will be able
to wear the rescue apparatus satisfactorily, because
under exertion he may require more air than the normal
person, or more than the machine can give. This is
extremely important, because should a case arise where
a man would begin to breathe too fast for the machine,
he will be forced to sit down or rest until his breathing
becomes normal again, or until the air supply of the
machine catches up to him. Meanwhile, he can do no
work whatever, and at certain times this forced rest
might prove fatal, especially in a fire, or where the
roof is working.

Selecting a Normal Man.

The most suitable candidate for mine rescue training
is the normal man, one not too large or too small,.not
too weak or too strong. Normal men are most suitable,
because their requirements for air can be more easily
met by the rescue apparatus. The apparatus is simply
a mechanical device, and, within its limits, it operates
automatically; but its operation is limited by its size
and capacity. It is a fixed machine, nothing more. It
will not respond to an increased demand made on it to
produce more air than it was designed for. Hence, it is
necessary for the man using it to work within its limits.
And the man who can do the most work within those
limits is naturally the most desirable and efficient
rescue man.

Amount of Air a Man Requires.

A man, leading an ordinary life, working by day and
resting by night, and consuming about 4| to 6|lb. of
solid food per day, inhales and exhales some 700 cu. ft.
of air (weighing approximately 621b.). From this the

* Lehigh Employes' Magazine,

body absorbs nearly 25 cu. ft. (2| lb.) of oxygen, and
converts it into carbon dioxide (CO2), and exhales
35 cu. ft. (4| lb.) of it. These figures are based on
careful experiments, and the values given (per hour) are
doubled or trebled in one hour of heavy work. Nor-
mally, the volume of air breathed by an average healthy
adult male is about 30 cu. in. per inhalation, and about
18 inhalations per minute. This makes a volume of
540 cu. in., or a little over 0’30 cu. ft., or 8-8 litres per
minute. Atmospheric air is composed of 79-1 per cent,
nitrogen and 20-9 per cent, oxygen. The air exhaled
from the lungs contains, on the average, 79-1 per cent,
nitrogen, 16-5 per cent, of oxygen, and 4-4 per cent,
carbon dioxide (CO2). The “ dead space ” formed by
the larger air tube is about 10 cu. in., and the air in the
lungs contains about 14 per cent, of oxygen (02), and
5 to 6 per cent, of carbon dioxide (C02).

Self-contained breathing apparatus for mine rescue
work is designed to supply about 70 litres of pure air
per minute (4,271-78 cu. in.) for the lungs when heavy
work is being done. To make this pure air, the
apparatus (oxygen compartments) must supply no less
than 2 litres (122 cu. in.) of oxygen per minute. The
nitrogen in the air is breathed over and over again. But
the apparatus must eliminate or absorb completely the
94 litres (3| cu. ft.) of carbon dioxide exhaled by a man
doing work during a period of two hours. This is done by
the potash cartridge, which unites chemically with the
exhaled CO2.

Thus it can be seen that though the supply of air and
oxygen are sufficient for a normal man, the capacity is
limited by the mechanical construction of the apparatus.
To make the machine larger would make it too
cumbrous.

To sum up, then, for the guidance of those who select
candidates for mine rescue training—pick a man with
the following qualifications : Age, about 28 to 40 years;
height, from 5 ft. 4 in. to 5 ft. 10 in.; weight, from
140 to 165 lb. He must be a good all-round man- about
the mines; well acquainted with local conditions; a
volunteer, with good steady nerves, and no physical dis-
abilities; and he must not use intoxicating liquors in
any form.

SOME RECENT DECISIONS UNDER THE
WORKMEN’S COMPENSATION ACT.

[Specially Contributed.]

A Difficult Case.

As time goes on absolutely fresh points of workmen’s com-
pensation law in the sense of statutory'■interpretation become
more rare, but the county courts continue to be vexed with
an unfailing supply of that type of case in which the difficulty
consists in deciding what inferences should be drawn from
the evidence, and whether a particular set' of facts comes
within the provisions of the Act. Such cases are frequently
of interest from the point of view of the facts as well as from
the legal standpoint. The details of a claim recently decided
at Wigan are of more than usual interest in connection with
colliery administration and management. Compensation
was claimed by the dependants of a workman who had been
employed as a hooker-on at the Alexandra Pit, Haigh, end
was killed by falling down the pit shaft. According to
counsel’s statement, the man had been not only hooker-on,
but pitman, lampman, searcher, and machineman. On the
opposite side to a mouthing where deceased was in charge
of the cage three or four men who were erecting a fence
about 4 ft. from the edge of the shaft heard the cage sig-
nalled from the surface. Soon after it returned, and the
men saw the deceased on the top deck. Why he was there
counsel did not know, but suggested that the man might have
gone into the cage to examine it or to see what the men were
doing on the other side. Shortly after the men heard a noise
like someone falling down the shaft, and>it was found that
the man had fallen between the side of the'cage deck and the
side of the shaft, a space of 14 in. The question for the
county court judge was whether the accident arose out of ?nd
in the course of the employment. In support of the applica-
tion it was submitted that where a man had so many duties
connected with the shaft and the cage, having practically
control of both while on duty, it was difficult to see that any-
thing he did with the cage would not arise out of and in the
course of the employment.

Reference may be made to the evidence so far as it seemed
to be material to the issue. A miners’ agent testified as to
the workman’s duties. As hooker-on he would have to
change the cage with coal during winding operations, to see
that the catches were down and the cage signalled away, and
he would be in charge of the fences at the pitmouth while
the cage was absent, while at a mouthing like this he would
be responsible for lowering and raising the leaf that covered
the space between the side of the cage and the pit. The leaf
was raised and lowered when the boxes were put into the
cage. As a pitman the hooker-on would have to examine
the shaft at the end of the day’s winding, and if anything
went wrong with the signalling wire he would have to
ascend the shaft to find out what the matter was. "Witness
did not know what the company meant by machinery inspec-
tor, unless there were small pumps or machinery at the
bottom of the shaft for which they held the deceased respon-
sible. At each end of the cage there w<as a gate, and
when winding men these gates were lowered down, ;as also
were the catches. The hooker-on was the man to get the
cage down, and would give the signal. The catch on the
far side would not necessarily be down, but would be down
when the cage came down. The hooker-on was in full
charge of the pit bottom, no one could go to the cage with-
out his permission, and he must see the cage right before it
went away. But while in full possession he need not see
that the gates were shut, as he might want to go through
the cage from one side to the other. When winding had
taken place it was not unusual for coal knocked from full
boxes to be lying .at the bottom of the cage. In this case
the hooker-on would walk into the cage and pick up the
coal to prevent it being knocked down the shaft and hitting
someone lower down. As deceased fell down the shaft the
gate must clearly have been open. The evidence of the
miners’ agent in support of the claim was supplemented by
that of one of the men who were erecting the fence on the
side of the shaft opposite where the deceased was. He
said that when the cage was not working it was usual to

have it as -a kind of protection. When deceased returned
with the cage witness saw him kneeling or sitting on .his
heels inside the cage, at the end where witness was. Two
minutes later a shout was heard, deceased was missing, and
his cap was found on the edge of the mouthing where
witness .and others were working. The Act of Parliament
required the safety appliances to be down, but the cage,
which had brought the pump-man from the surface, would
have to be opened at the mine above, the mine at which the
accident happened being second from the surface.

For the company it was submitted that deceased thought
fit to watch the men working, but that was no part of his
duty, being merely a risk he was running to satisfy his own
curiosity. There were duties that would bring a hooker-on
into danger, but that was not one of them. The removal
of a piece of coal from the cage, had that been necessary,
would not have taken more than a minute. Deceased could
then have got out, but instead he was seen kneeling or
crouching inside the cage, with the catch and the pendulum
up, watching the men working. In support of this case evi-
dence was given by a workman who was in charge of the
men erecting the fence. "When the cage came down he saw
deceased lift up the pendulums on the north side and then
kneel down to watch them erect the fence. The accident
happened about ten minutes after the cage came down.
Deceased was not assisting them in any way, and would
have no duty there until the fence was finished. He might
be interested in seeing that the work was properly done, end
might have gone across for that reason. If there was any-
thing wrong on that side he would have to go across. As
hooker-on he was in charge, and could go anywhere. There
was a bye-pass by which deceased could have gone from one
side to the other without crossing the shaft. On the ground
of safety witness would have used the bye-pass even if he
had been in a hurry, us the shaft was quite unsafe until the
fence was erected. A fireman who was one of the men
working on the north side said that deceased had nothing to
d) with anything that was going on there, and was not in
any way responsible, a statement that was supported by Mr.
F. Edmond, colliery manager. He admitted that a hooker-
on was entitled to go into u cage whenever he thought it
necessary, but did not think the deceased was justified in
using the cage in preference to the bye-pass. The county
court judge held that the accident was due to a risk incidental
to the employment, and therefore arose out of and in the
course of the employment. He considered that it was no
part of his duty to find or infer what exactly, the man’s
work was when he met his death. The man was admittedly
entitled to be in the cage in the performance of his duties,
and his Honour considered it was sufficient to find that
deceased was engaged in one or other of his duties. The
case is a decidedly instructive one, and has therefore been
referred to at some length.

The Will to Work.

In this column we have had occasion to express the opinion
that in workmen’s compensation cases the attendance of a
medical referee as an assessor sitting with the county court
judge should be compulsory on the application of one of the
parties, and should not be merely at the discretion of the
judge. A recent hearing at "Wigan shows that even with the
aid of an assessor decisions are sometimes difficult enough
to arrive at. As long ago as May 1907, a workman in the
service of the Garswood Hall Collieries Company Limited
received an injury to his knee and had been drawing com-
pensation ever since. The company, however, came to the
conclusion that the man was no longer totally incapacitated,
and should be able to do light work at the colliery. In 1912
two medical men were of opinion that varicose veins from
which the man suffered were not the result of his accident,
but the medical referee thought otherwise, and also thought
that the man was not fit for his ordinary or any other work.
At the recent hearing a medical witness expressed the
opinion that the man was now fit to work, and another said
that he had examined the man from time to time, and had
found so much improvement that witness had reported that
the man should be at work. Mr. Harrison, surface manager
at the colliery, said that the company would find the man
work at scraping and blacking wagons. Men could do that
work sitting down, and could earn 3s. 6d. a day for six
days a week.

Giving evidence for the workman, a medical witness said
that he had had charge of the man’s case since the accident,
and had examined him frequently. He was of opinion that
if there had been any change since the medical referee
reported the man was now physically less fit than he was
then. He thought the man could earn something, but could
not do any muscular work. He could not sit for a long
time, but had to keep changing his position. Another
medical witness, who had examined the man in April,
expressed the opinion that the patient’s condition was the
same as when the medical referee reported in 1912. He
would not advise the man to do anything for some time
except take graduated exercises. The witness admitted that
if such exercises had been taken during the last four years
there would have been an improvement. Evidence was then
given by the workman, himself, and he confessed incidentally
that he had not tried to fit himself for any other occupation
or business. He was examined by the medical referee, and
afterwards the county court judge said they were satisfied
that the man could do some work, but that it was difficult on
the evidence to say what his earning capacity was. The
judge thought, however, that the earning capacity would
improve, and suggested that the man might go to the colliery
at first for two days a week, not necessarily consecutive
days, then for three days, and so on. Finally, the case was
adjourned on the understanding that the man would present
himself and honestly attempt to do what work he could, if
only for two hours a day at first. He was admonished by the
judge to do his very best, and not to expect to find work easy
after being off for ten years.

The late Mr. J. J. Timmis, Birkenhead, director of the
Cannock and Rugeley Colliery Company Limited, and other
companies, left F25,647.

The late Mr. John Stevens, of Birmingham, formerly of
Burton-on-Trent, coal owner, left estate of the gross value of
T70,004.

The late Mr. John Lee Potter, of Lowestoft, Worsley-road,
Worsley, near Manchester, coal merchant, left property of the
value of T16,346.

Mr. F. Dudley Docker, C.B., chairman of the Metro-
politan Carriage, Wagon and Finance Company Limited, has
joined the committee of the Council for the Organisation of
British Engineering Industry.