BLASTING COAL

Grey River Argus, 31 December 1941, Page 7

BLASTING COAL

FROM RIVER BOTTOM'. The State of West Viginia (U.S.A. has leased the coal' mining rights under a 15-mile stretch of the Ohio River to a company that is planning to begin operations soon. 1 This is not a dredging proposition; , to recover coal washed down the 1 river from mines further up-stream, but coal will be minted from seams that outcrop along the river bottom. How the work will be carried on is described as follows in the Fairmont "West Virginian’': A search of available records dur- y ing the negotiations disclosed no pre- - 'cedent for this proposal to “mine” coal directly beneath 10 to 30 feet of flowing water. That it can be done the company (the Atlas Coal and Dredge Co ) proved about a year ago, when, during an experiment, it produced about 10,000 tons of river-bottom coal. The plan of operation sounds simple. And old U.S. governmental dredge boat and a couple of bargtes will be the principal pieces of equips ment. Blast holes will be drilled in the coal through a pipe to kteep out sediment. Explosiv’e cartridges waterproof jackets will be lowered into them and set off with eltectric detonators to loosen the coal. The dredge boat with its four-cubic-ya'rd dipper bucket: —a yard roughly, equals a ton —will scoop up . the coal and deposit it on thte “tipple barge” alongside. * This barge, just like the tipple of ordinary coal mine, will contain screens to. size the coal, a place for mten to pick out slate and other foreign matter, a washer and conveyor belts to carry it directly to a third barge for shipment. Dr. W. W. Hodge, director of West • Virginia University’s mining extension divison, estmates that 4,000,000 tons of good-quality coal lie within 25 feet of the river’s surface. The * dredge boat’s 35ft. boom may be able to reach another 6,000,000 tons. ■ —Common Cause, Dec. 6. 1941.