U.S. MINE DISASTER.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 213, 8 September 1923, Page 7

U.S. MINE DISASTER.

TRAGEDY IN WYOMING. LIKE A -WAR SCENE. HERO SAVED 26 LIVES. (From Oar Own Correspondent.) SAN FRANCIBCO, August 17. I Further details of the terribie mining disaster at the Wyoming district of Kemmerer, when S7 bodies had been recovered, tended to show that the catastrophe was in all probability caused by a careless coal miner lighting a cigarette, an act which brought death to almost every home in the little town near the mine. Some of the 37 miners, who were gallantly rescued by comrades at imminent risk to their own lives, held the opinion, however, that the tragedy was the result of a gas explosion, followed by both white and black damp. Some of the rescued miners claimed to have seen a tongue of flame shoot from the extreme low levels when the blast occurred, while others were of contrary opinion. Rescue workers laboured untiringly throughout the night in their efforts to j reach the other bodies, and would not j relax until they had all been recovered, j Kemmerer and the adjoining coal set- , tlement of Frontier immediately went into mourning, and preparations went : forward for the burial of the dead, and a general funeral was held fur the victims. At Frontier, the widows, children, ar.d others left by the unfortunate miners were stunned by the suddenness of the disaster, which took away those so endeared to them. Some of them gathered in groups and tearfully discussed the | tragedy, for there was hardly a home j in Frontier that was not affected in some wa} , . Three youthful miners, who persistently refused to give their names, and who started to work for the coal com- 11 pany in the mine on the day of the explosion, were on their new jobs on one of the lower levels but a few minutes when the fatal blast occurred. They said there was a detonation an<T then a rush of air. The level on which they were stationed was not Hooded i with the death-dealing gases, and. fearing to move, they waited from shortly . after 8 a.m., when the blast happened, until 3.45 p.m.. when rescue workers reached them. The youths went through ( a terrible experience, but when brought to the surface, they speedily revived. Other miners—men who had served overseas in France in the World War — | spoke of the suffocating gas fumes as worse than the German gas with which they had fought on the battlefields. ' As new? of the explosion spread quickly throughout Kemmerer and Frontier, a crowd, estimated to number 1000 persons, gathered at the portal of the mine and maintained a frantic, fearful vigil throughout the day and far into the night. Wives, mothers, sisters, daughters, sweethearts and children or the entombed men pressed against the rope barrier strung around the shaft, and at times overwhelmed the small force of Kemmerer police and volunteers as rescue crews emerged from the underground tomb. Hysterically. women wept for a lius- ■ band, father, brother or lover as the hours passed, and only a few survivors straegled from the mouth of the pit. , Children's cries mingled with the heart- , breaking cries of faithful watchers, , when it became apparent that no more men remained alive in the mine and', rescue workers ceased their search for j the livine and turned to the task of j bringing forth the dead. , HEEDED ADVICE. i John Pavlizin was heralded as the hero of the mine disaster, for unaided, he was credited with saving the lives ( of 20 fellow miners, who were working j with him in one of the "rooms' , off the j main stope. (i He had been through three sucli mine I s explosions, and is a veteran miner. When the workers heard the blast, 1 Pavlizin commanded the men to halt • ( as they rushed in their excitement for j i the door of the Toom toward the main . ' pnssageway. Hurricdlv. Pavlizin ex-.' plained the danger of afterdamp in the ( main passageway, and cautioned the men to remain in the room Twenty-six heeded his advice and the others rushed I out of the room to meet the death- j laden gases which swept through the stope. ( The 26. under Pavlizin's instructions, barricaded themselves in the rooms in j which -tliev lmd been working, prpcted j barricades of bits of canvas and their I clothes, to keep out the foul gases. Thei'o I the rescue workers found them alive | hours later. Iving on the mine floor. ! none apparently showing any siffns of j sulTerina, but all fnmi=hed with hunger | and almost naked through having to | tear their clothing from their bodies , to tuck in crevices to keen out the drend afterdamp. As tlip 26 survivors from this chnniWr wnlked down iho ( mnin ptope to the snfetv zone they j passed the bodies of tVJr comrnrlns who hud rn«hed precipitately unheeding to I their deaths.