Description

No. 26 on the list. — This accident occurred at Adelaide Colliery, belonging to Messrs. Pease and Partners, Ltd., on April 24th last, about 10 o'clock in the morning, causing the deaths of two men, Wm. Carnegie, a joiner, and William Kell, a coal hewer, in the downcast shaft.

This shaft is divided by a brick partition or brattice from the surface to the Brockwell seam, a distance of 172 fathoms, and on one side of it, known as the back shaft, is a small cage by which the men were changed from all the seams. On the other side of the brattice, known as the main or drawing shaft, is the regular large or coal cage. This arrangement was adopted in order to prevent the stoppage of work while men were descending and ascending to and from their work.

The Brockwell seam has been exhausted and abandoned, and coal is now principally worked from the Busty seam, at a point 21 fathoms above the old level or hanging-on, and it is therefore not necessary to run the main cage to that seam. An alteration had only been made, a few days before the accident happened, by placing a metal girder across the shaft, and upon this a stout baulk of wood, called a "beating bunton," upon which the cage rests at the Busty seam level.

On the morning in question Carnegie was going to the Brockwell seam to get the particulars of some machinery, and Kell, who hewed coals for the boilers in that seam, joined him. The journey seems to have been safely made until getting to the Busty seam, when the engineman noticed the rope jerk, and at once stopped the engine. The onsetter at the Busty seam hauging-on, in the main shaft, heard the cage coming down, and when opposite to where he was standing it struck something. Carnegie shouted to send word to bank that the cage was sticking, but he (the onsetter) had not time to do this, as the cage fell away. He heard the rope running on to the top of the cage after it struck. The jerk, caused by the falling away of the cage and being caught by the rope again, caused Kell to fall out to the bottom of the shaft, and he was killed instantly. Carnegie held on to the cage, and when it stopped shouted, "rap down." This was done; he got to the bottom, and was then taken to bank and sent home, but died from the shock about 12.30 in the afternoon of the same day.

The cage had caught the end of the new "beating bunton," as was shown by the chafed condition it was found to be in. The large cages beating upon it continuously had caused it, no doubt, to work out of its place, through the partition, some 2 inches, and the cage in the back shaft in coming down had struck it. This cage had two wire rope conductors, one on each side, and would consequently oscillate considerably, probably as much as 6 inches, and if this was so, as there was only 4 inches of space between the brattice and the cage, anything projecting, as the "beating bunton" would do, would easily catch it.

Now that the Brockwell seam has been abandoned, except for a pumping engine being kept at work, the large winding engine is quite capable of dealing with the quantity of coal drawn and also the changing of the men. I suggested that the back shaft should be done away with, and that any men that had to go to the Brockwell seam should be sent to the Busty hanging-on, and travel from there by an existing stone-drift.

Sources

• 1889 Mines Inspectors Report (C 6015), Durham District (No. 4) by Thomas Bell, H.M. Inspector of Mines, Page: 27, Accident Number: 26 Where to find this report
• 1889 Mines Inspectors Report (C 6015), Durham District (No. 4) by Thomas Bell, H.M. Inspector of Mines, Page: 6 Where to find this report

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