TERROR OF THE PIT.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3144, 20 November 1922, Page 2

TERROR OF THE PIT.

(Bv Ronald Campbell Maefie, M.A., M.8.) There have been many terrible colliery accidents, the worst on record being" the disaster, about 1G years ago, at the French mine Courrieres, in which over 1000 miners perished. The Whitehaven disaster has cost comparatively few lives, yet it emphasises once again the perils of the collier's occupation. The causes of coal mine explosions are well known. The commonest causes are inarsh gas, or methane, popularly called "fire-damp," and coal dust. Marsh gas is formed by decaying vegetation (deriving its name from the fact that it often bubbles up in marshes), and since coal is a product of decayed vegetation, that gas sometimes fills interspaces in the coal, and escapes when the coal is cut. Sometimes as it escapes it makes a singing sound, which the French miners call chant du grison. It is a gas lighter than air and does not support combustion or respiration, hence a lamp will go out in it, and an animal will die of suffocation. Mixed with air and set alight, it explodes and expands with terrific violence.

Marsh gas is the chief cause of collierv explosions, and was probably the cause of the accident at Whitehaven, though coal dust may also have contributed to the explosion. Under certain conditions, as when floating in the air, and exposed to heat and flame, coal gas gives off marsh gas and other explosive gases, which burn and explode. The explosions which have occurred in some mines free from marsh gas. such as the Timbury and Camerton, have undoubtedly been due to coal dust. Naturally in view of these dangers, improved safety-lamps have been provided, and thorough ventilation instituted at all mines; but in spite of all precautions explosions still occur. An explosion fills the neighboring galleries of a pit with a mixture of poisonous gases, the "afterdamp," consisting chiefly of carbon dioxide (black damp) and carhon monoxide (white damp), either of which in sufficient concentration is fatal. Happily death from explosion is instantaneous, and death from afterdamp quite painless. Sir Clement Le Neve Foster, who almost died from carbon monoxide poisoning in a mine, employed what he believed to be his last moments in writing a letter to his friends, and though his letter shows that his mind was weakening, it gives a comforting description of his feelings. Here are some of his words: — "I feel as if T were dreaming, no real pain, good-bye, good-bye. I «feel as if I were sleeping. . . . N[o pain, it is merely like a dream, no pain ; no pain, for the benefit of others I say no pain at all; no pain, no pain." Perhaps these words of Sir Clement "Le Neve Foster may be of a little comfort now to those who lost friends and relatives in the disaster at the Whitehaven Colliery.