A FLOATING COAL MINE.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 8, Issue 29, 9 April 1907, Page 7

A FLOATING COAL MINE.

Most people would think, naturally enough, that the obvious way to.discharge a coal cargo would bo from the top. But, nowadays, it is exactly the reverse ; the easiesjt way is to restore the fuel, after a fashion, to something resembling the position it originally occupied underground, and work it out afresh from underneath. That is why the Admiralty have recently built several craft which are literally floating coal pits.

One, of about the size of the battleships of a year or two ago, holds 12,000 tons, and was built on tho Tyne for service at Portsmouth. Another, considerably smaller in size, has recently been launched on tho Thames. In both of them the general idea is alike. The vessel’s are fitted with shafts and levels, exactly as in a colliery, which, when tho holds through which these extend are filled, penetrate the whole mass. But there is no hewing as in a pit.

In the bottom level a k number of apertures are fitted, to which hags can he affixed, and, when this is done, the valves closing the apertures are opened, causing the coal above to fdl the sacks. These are then placed upon trolleys running upon a miniature railway mid along the level, drawn to the shaft, hoisted up there, and conveyed by transporters to the hunkers of the man-of-war moored alongside. No shovel need touch the fuel ; no human hand need move it directly. The force of gravity fills the sacks; electricity does the ivst. Not only so, but the same power lights and, through fans, ventilates the under-coal passages, and sends messages from the vesscjl .which is being hunkered to the depths of the craft from which the coal is being extracted. In all respects, save hewing, the latter is exactly a coal mine afloat.