Disasters - Names		Disasters - Names

Date:	10th January 1919
Colliery:	North Elswick
Cause:	Explosion
Lives Lost:	2

There were 2 serious accidents due to explosions of firedamp or coal dust during the year, which resulted in the death of 3 persons. Both accidents were caused by shot-firing.

The first accident occurred at the North Elswick Colliery, Newcastle-on-Tyne. This mine is 259 yards deep to the Brockwell Seam, in which the explosion occurred. A comparatively new district, worked longwall with stepped faces had been set away at a point about 2,500 yards from the shafts, in which 21 hewers per shift were employed on two shifts.

The mine is usually dry, and it was so in the explosion area, though further in-bye water is met with both in the roof and floor. Patterson's Al Safety Lamps are used. No shot-firing is done in the coal, which is from 2 feet 6 inches to 3 feet 3 inches thick, but to make height for hand-putting in the gateways a 2-foot thick bottom canch is shot up. Top canches are taken down further out-bye to make height on the pony roads. Shot-firing is confined to the night shift, when only the stonemen are in the mine. Dynobel, No. 3, permitted explosive is used with a maximum charge of 18 ozs., fired by electric battery with a No. 6 detonator.

The roof of the Brockwell Seam is usually a fairly strong sandstone, but for some 30 yards back from the face of the explosion area a blue shale had set in between the coal and the sandstone. This shale is difficult to keep up, and in consequence numerous falls of roof had taken place along the coal face. Four of these falls must have impeded the ventilation rather seriously, and in addition to cutting off a proper supply of air to the place of accident, probably allowed firedamp to accumulate in the adjacent workings.

On the afternoon of the 10th January, the chargeman made an inspection of the district concerned, and at about 6 p.m., when he was alone in the district, fired a shot. He afterwards met his men and placed them where they had to work. Later on he joined a workman named Blair, who was drilling a hole in the bottom canch of a gateway which had just been turned away close to where the shot was fired at 6 p.m. After charging the hole the two men retired some 28 yards and fired the shot. Immediately they were both enveloped in flame and badly burnt; they were able, however, to make their way out-bye in the dark for a distance of 100 yards. They were conveyed to the infirmary, where Blair died two days later and the chargeman seven days later.

After the explosion it was found that the shot had done its work all right. The exact amount of explosive put into the hole is not known, but it is probable that 12 ozs. were used. The shot would be placed in a nearly horizontally drilled hole about 3 feet 6 inches deep, close to the bottom of the canch, which is about 2 feet thick, in a fairly strong blue seggar stone. The stone is usually free from fissures, but after the debris from the shot was cleared away J observed a strongly marked "jack," or parting, right at the back of the hole and running nearly at right angles to it. This parting or facing was in the bottom half of the canch and, the upper half having been disturbed by the shot, it could not be ascertained definitely whether the facing ran completely through the upper portion.

The shothole was placed about 3 yards back from the face of the gate and 4 yards back from the face of a crossgate. As only the right-hand pack of the crossgate was built to within 3 yards of the face there was a large open space. According to the indications of coked dust upon the timber and sides of the roadways, the explosion carried about a distance of 70 yards, both with and against the ventilating current. There were no marks of real violence and no timber which had been set was displaced. One or two canvas stoppings were blown down, and stones and pieces of broken timber were blown into the roadways within an area of 30 yards of the shothole.

There can be no doubt that the shot fired by the chargeman ignited whatever firedamp was present. This shot may have been slightly overcharged, and, owing to the parting or facing, its work was reduced until it acted almost like a blown-out shot. The chargeman was considered by the management to be a most careful man and experienced at such work. It can only be surmised that he failed to examine the places for firedamp before firing the last shot. There was a considerable amount of gas in the faces of two of the gates the day after the explosion. The roof of the gate where the shot was fired entirely collapsed two days afterwards; there were signs, too, that other portions of the roof had been weighting and breaking and doubtless liberating gas.

Source:

1919 Mines Inspectors Report (Cmd 925)

	Blair, Frank, explosion
	1 of 2 names found

 

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