THE LAKE COLERIDGE YUNNEL.

Colonist, Volume LIV, Issue 13458, 2 July 1912, Page 4

THE LAKE COLERIDGE YUNNEL.

DANGERS IN THE DRIVE

L;Unitb» JPKBoa AisooiATios.'l

GhristehMrch, July 1

According to tho men who hr.vo been employed on the Lake Coleridge hydroeleotrical installation works tho conditions under which tho men are employed on tho tunnel contract labour are fac from satisfactory. James Ryan, a miner, 'who has been; engaged at mining .•■ll bis life, stated to I a newspaper rc-vvior t--d . / that the-: [conditions at L -. ... ii<.;4o are tho-. i worst-he has ever ■.:.■■.<.> . >.. Re =■, as working at the outlet, yoriit-in of the tunnel,, urid described the country being worked, through as consisting mostly of a kind of sand with boulders in it. Three shifts after he went down to work m this portion of the tunnel two men werenearly killed owing to a fall of earth and stones from tho roof. Ho alleges that, with three men in a shift, six feet per day is being driven. He further alleges'that the timbering is a long way behind, and contends that in such soft cotintry the timbering should bo kept close up to the men working en the face. There are, ho states, chains and chainswithout timbering, and he anticipates, serious trouble unless something ia dorip> when the men meet who are driving thetunnel from the opposite ends. He himself took from tho roof a boulder weighing twenty pounds which, if it had landed »n a vital spot, would have been sufficont to kill a man. On another occasion two men had. tho tools knocked from their hnnds by a fall of earth from tht* re;;!'. When Ryan spoke to tho leader of the shift on tho subject ho replied, *' I think timber is wanted, but the boss thinks different."