TYNESIDE MINE TO CLOSE

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27395, 7 July 1954, Page 14

TYNESIDE MINE TO CLOSE

Dewatering Project Abandoned

MEETING OF PROTEST TO BE CALLED

(From Our Own Reporter) I GREYMOUTH, July 6. The Government has decided to abandon the Tyneside State coalmirfe in the Brunner field. Dewatering efforts have been going on now for four years, but two recent rises in the Grey river, and other set-backs, have! caused the water level in the old workings to rise considerably. The Government’s decision to aban-| don the project is viewed seriously ini the Brunner district, as the rehabuita-1 tion of this 50-year-old mine was de-1 signed to provide employment fori workers at the adjoining Wallsend mine, which has a brief future. Pro-1 test meetings are planned in the district in an attempt to persuade the Government to persevere with the battle against water. Since 1910 water | has partially filled the workings. The Brunner Miners’ Union has asked the Brunner Borough Council to organise a protest against the decision, and a , public meeting has been called for Monday next.

62,000,000 Gallons The estimated coal available in the Tyneside area is 700,000 tons, of high bituminous quality. Efforts were firs made in 1950 to pump 62,000,000 gal-1 lons of water out of the abandoned mine, but with each rise in the Grey I river huge quantities of water have] been absorbed, submerging a pump and other valuable equipment. A year’s work was recently, wrecked! when the level rose 40ft. The project had been tackled through the original shaft sunk into the seam before the turn of the century, but it was proposed, if the project was successful, to link the existing Wallsend mine with Tyneside workings by a tunnel. The growing water problem ruined the Tyneside mine at a time when it became an important unit in coal development on the West Coast. Originally it was a contemporary of the ill-fated Brunner mine, which produced 2,500,000 tons of coal before the 1896 disaster. As the Brunner mine was worked out at the turn of the century, the Tyneside, on the other side of the river, increased in Importance. In 1906 its output was 61,574 tons. The mine was closed because of the water problem about 1910. Efforts were made in 1926 to bring the mine back in to production by a private company, but flooding ruined their efforts. About six years ago, with the life of the Wallsend mine drawing to a close, the Government began to take an interest in the possibilities of the Tyneside, and finance was provided for an attempt to save it.