July 24, 1914

Supplement to THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

xiii

under the roof from which supports had been taken ; in
several instances fatalities occurred through the worker
failing to utilise proper safety appliances provided for
his use. On the other hand, 79 fatalities occurred at
the coal face, without blame being attachable either to
workmen or officials, for the reason that the system of
timbering laid down by the management was not violated.

Little progress has been made towards the general use
of bars in the stalls, for the reason that unless fatalities
occur where the system of timbering is that of props*
and lids alone, the management consider systematic
barring unnecessary, and it is by no means the practice
to use bars tp secure the roof in the stalls unless
inherent difficulties due to prevalent physical conditions
of the roof, such as slips and bumps, are known to exist,
or where the roof cannot generally be kept up by the
ordinary system of setting props. Had bars been
systematically used, probably no less than 20 lives
would have been saved at the coal face. As stated, 40
per cent, of the fatalities occurred in that part of the
stall known as the “ gate-end.” As probably 98 per
cent, of the coal got in the division is won by the
longwall method, the area of roof and side at the
gate-end is only about a tenth of the whole area of each
stall; 40 per cent, is therefore an abnormal percentage
under such conditions, and the adoption of systematic
barring of all gates before ripping is done would prevent
many accidents. Where the height of the roof is not
sufficient to allow of timber bars, iron strips might be
used to advantage. Of the remaining 60 per cent, of
the falls at the face, the remedial measures in many
cases would appear to be :—

1.	Stricter supervision in working-places in order to
check delay in setting up supports' to roof and sides. ')

2.	A more liberal use of timber.

3.	The straightening of the line of the coal face to
avoid projections of coal bursting off suddenly.

4.	The education of the worker to carry out
systematically, thoroughly and promptly, the method
of timbering best calculated to prevent falls, and not
to take risks unnecessarily.

The last-named measure could probably be helped on
by supplying each deputy with a print on cloth showing
the system of timbering to be observed in the working-
places (both as regards roof and sides), with instructions
to explain to his men what is really expected of them.
It is true the maximum distances to be observed when

setting supports underground is already posted up at
the pit-head in accordance with the Act; still, among so
many notices now required to be exhibited, the most
important of all, so far as the working miner is con-
cerned, is apt to escape the notice of the very persons
whom it was intended to help. It remains to be
recorded that 7,599,836 tons, or 10 per cent, of the
output of coal, was produced by coal-cutting machines,
and that only four lives were lost by falls of roof. This
speaks well for the comparatively safe conditions pro-
duced by systematic timbering, straight faces, and
regular working of the coal face.

During the year there were 13 separate fatal shaft
accidents, by which 29 persons were killed, and 17 non-
fatal accidents involving injury to 41 persons. The
most serious accident of the year occurred on
February 7 at Rufford sinkings, belonging to the
Bolsover Colliery Company Limited, near Mansfield,
Nottinghamshire, when 14 persons lost their lives
and three others were injured by a water barrel, which
after being overwound, subsequently fell back down the
shaft, through the breakage of the clivvy or hook by
which the barrel was attached to the winding rope. By
the request of the Home Office technical points con-
nected with the disaster were held over for the special
Home Office enquiry, subsequently held by Mr. William
Walker, one of H.M. divisional inspectors of mines, by
whom a special report on the cause and circumstances
of the disaster was subsequently made to the Secretary
of State.* The next accident, most serious in its con-

sequences, occurred at St. John’s Colliery, the property
of Messrs. Locke and Co. (Newland) Limited, Norm an ton,
Yorkshire, and by it four persons lost their lives and
two other men were injured. The winding shaft is
470 yards deep, and when 10 men were being raised in
the cage, at the end of their shift, one of the wooden
receiving rods, 27 ft. long, 8 in. by 6 in., got loose and
by falling vertically down the shaft pierced through
both the roof and top deck floor of the ascending cage,
killing four of the men. The rod was one of the two
centre rods which steady the cages as they leave the
top of the shaft guides. It was attached to baulks by
two | in. bolts and an L piece of iron
by screws to the floor of the top
landing. The rod was plated with
two straps of iron which did not Q
meet round the point at the bottom.
It would seem that in a previous wind
the ascending cage caught the bottom
of the receiving rod, bending up the
strap slightly in the shape of a hook
as shown at C on the sketch, and
that when descending, the top ring of
the cage caught this hook and pulled

the rod off. After the disaster, the bolts by which the
rod was secured to the baulks were found to be shorn in

A.

c

two, and, though corroded, not badly so. The accident
apparently was caused in one of two ways—either the
wear and tear of the shaft guides near the top caused
too much “ play ” or vibration in the cage itself as it
entered the receiving rods, or the iron strap on the rod
had, by constant usage, worked loose and formed a
projection and got caught by the cage. After the
accident a stronger receiving rod was installed, and at
the inquest the jury recommended the opposite rod
should be made as strong as the new one, and that bolts

* Report dated July 26, 1913, by W. Walker, Esq., H.M.
inspector of mines, on the causes and circumstances
attending the accident which recurred February 7, 1913, at
Ruff ord ^Colliery, N ottinghamshire.

be renewed every 10 years. The owners agreed to carry
out this recommendation.

Two sinkers lost their lives by drowning—one at
Ingleton Colliery, Yorkshire, the other at Welbeck
sinkings in Nottinghamshire. In the former case a man
accidentally slipped through the centre opening of a
scaffold. At Welbeck Colliery the scaffold on which
deceased was standing, along with 16 other men, was
being raised by a steam winch in order to start a fresh
length of brickwork. Owing to unequal capping of the
two ropes on their respective drums, one side of the
scaffold got about 2 ft. higher than the other. When
attempting to remedy this, the engineman disengaged
one of the drums, and the brake, through not acting
properly, allowed the drum, carrying one of the ropes,
to run, with the result that the scaffold tilted enor-
mously, and one of the sinkers was thrown off the
scaffold and killed by drowning. The brake was
immediately afterwards examined by the enginewright
of the colliery and found by him to be in order. He
attributed the accident to the brake not being properly
applied. When the company’s attention was subse-
quently directed to the matter, they agreed—(1) to
improve their winding apparatus by fixing a pawl on
the spur wheels to prevent the drum from accidentally
running back; (2) to reduce the number of men on the
scaffold while it is being raised or lowered ; (3) to
provide a ladder in the shaft bottom attached either to
the shaft side or to the bricking scaffold.

As Regulation 21 (a) requires the fence at the pit
bottom to be closed wh.en the cage is absent, the type of
gate best suited to act automatically has exercised the
minds of mine managers since that regulation came into
force in September last. It has been found that when
the cage operates the fence, the latter, owing to the
weight and speed of the cage, is soon damaged. To
obviate this, the manager of Creswell Colliery, Notting-
hamshire, has designed a gate to be opened automatically
by the tub before entering the cage. The first gate
installed is not an entire success, owing to the fairly
high speed at which the gate opens, and another type,

Empty-side Gates

Fig. 13.—Automatic Gates in Use at
(Creswell Colliery.



2
£

2

shown herewith, has also been installed to overcome this
objection. The levers are arranged to give a straight
motion outwards to one half of the gate, while this is
modified by the other half moving radially from a fixed
point in the shaft. The movement is thus rendered
slow enough to avoid shock, and a balance weight closes
the gate. All loaded coal tubs are put into the cage on
one side of the shaft. On the opposite side the tubs
leaving the cage open the gate, which is then closed by
spiral springs. When persons are entering or leaving
the cage, the gate is easily operated by hand.

The fatal accidents under the heading of “ Miscel-
laneous Underground Accidents” numbered 60, involving
the loss of 69 lives, as against 62 in the preceding year.
Two deaths were from explosives, three from suffocation
by natural gases, eight from an inrush of water; 44
from haulage, six from electricity, one by machinery,
and five from sundry causes.

On January 28 two men—James English, a certified
deputy, and Alfred Sykes, a byeworkman—lost their
lives in Lodge Mill Colliery, near Huddersfield, York-
shire, through being overcome and poisoned by noxious
gases in some old workings which had been gas-bound
for a fortnight, and into which, contrary to the Coal
Mines Act, they had gone to continue the recovery of
some rails. In less than half an hour, the Altofts rescue
party, wearing the Weg apparatus, recovered the three
men—Sykes, English, and Schofield.* Sykes was dead

*Mr. Lloyd contributed a paper living an account of the
use of rescue apparatus at Lodge Mill Colliery to the
Transactions, of the Institution of Mining Engineers,
Volume xlvi., page 250. This paper also contains a most
valuable note by Dr. Haldane, F.R.S., on the effects of gas
poisoning experienced at Lodge Mill Colliery.

and apparently had been so for some hours. In the case
of the other two, artificial respiration was resorted to ;
both were apparently on the high road to recovery and
were removed to the surface on stretchers and thence
to Huddersfield Infirmary. Schofield recovered, but
the deputy, English, was unable to recover from the
shock, and, it is said, succumbed through dilatation
of the heart brought on by pleuritic adhesions. Had

Return Wheel, I SOO yard* from shaft.

Sykes

A Schcflsld
rTt/i i sb

i’

ci-'t___________JS Ij L N»A J-j'i Nj4

[i i|r5,h Ending	j

Fig. 14.—Workings at Lodge Mill Colliery’
where Two Men were Suffocated on'
January 28, 1913.	‘

efficient rescue apparatus, and men thoroughly
trained to its use, been available at the colliery or in
the neighbourhood, the lives of the other two men might
have been ssved. Neither apparatus nor brigades were
available nearer than Altofts, although it is only fair to
state that the owner of the colliery was a member of the
Owners’ Association, which, at the time of the accident,
was building a rescue station at Wakefield within a
radius of 10 miles of the colliery, in order to comply
with the Rescue and Aid Order made by the Secretary
of State. Another case of suffocation by noxious gases
occurred at A Winning Colliery, Alfreton, belonging to

Fig. 15.—Sketch Plan of Workings
“A” Winning Colliery, Alfrton.

sP

Main\ Intake

the Blackwell Colliery Company, on January 17, where
the Low Main coal seam is worked on the longwall
method, and naked lights are used at a depth of
236 yards. At 10 o’clock in the morning, a wooden cog
at the corner of 81’s crossgate in the main intake, 1,100
yards from the pit bottom (see point A on sketch), was
discovered on fire by a lad named Hall. He at once
reported the matter to the deputy, Thomas Perkins,
who, accompanied by another man, passed on into the
workings and ran the 60 men employed there out by the
return aircourse. Unfortunately two men had already
started up 40’s crossgate 150 yards inbye of the fire and
faced the smoke in the level. The first man, Wileman,
more or less affected by fumes, got through but
the other man, Henry Kerry, 53 years of age, failed,
and Wileman in the excitement did not, it was said,
tell anyone that Kerry, who was following, had been
left behind. Through the cog collapsing a heavy fall
of roof occurred, and not until the following day was
Kerry’s body discovered at the point B. After travelling
up 40’s gate Kerry passed through two doors, and was,
apparently, quickly overcome by the fumes before he
could get out and before he was missed. The system
of cheeking the men at this colliery broke down in
respect that the manager did not know that Kerry was
missing until 6 p.m. on the day of the fire. The system
consisted of having a number for each gate—each man
putting his own check mark on a board before going in
and rubbing it off on his way out. Generally, as the
men travelled out together, the practice was for the
stallman to rub all the marks off for his own bank, and
in some way unexplained, on the day of the accident,
the marks for Kerry’s stall were wiped off while Kerry
was still in the workings The management being
dissatisfied with the system, proceeded at once to amend
it. Even had Kerry been missed and his whereabouts
known, probably the fire helmets with 20 yards of
piping which were available, would have been of no use,
for the deceased was found 55 yds. inbye of the fire. The
company were members of the Mansfield rescue station.
Spontaneous combustion is unknown in this mine, and
it was suggested that a box of matches, placed in the
cog. had squeezed by pressure of the strata and became
ignited. As the cog was two years old and settled, it
seems more probable that a cigarette had been thrown