HEAVY DEATH ROLL

Wairarapa Age, 3 March 1927, Page 5

HEAVY DEATH ROLL

TWO COLLIERY DISASTERS IN BRITAIN.

MANY DEAD IN WELSH PIT. FOURTEEN VICTIiLS IN NOTTS. LONDON, March 1. Two simultaneous mine disasters, one in Monmouth and the other in Nottinghamshire, brought widespread tragedy to the homes of scores of mining folk. So far it is believed that the total death.roll in both places is 75, including 61 at the Cwm Colliery, Monmouth. The total is made up as follows:—• Brought up dead, 5; entombed and presumed dead, 33; bodies lying in tho workings, 23. An unheralded explosion, succeeded by flames and poisonous gases, was responsible for the Cwm colliery calamity. Bilsthorpe pit was the scene of the Nottingham disaster, v. here water-pipes in the shaft broke loose and hurled a staging, on which 17 men wore working, to the bottom of the shaft. Three were rescued, and the remaining fourteen killed by the fall or drowned. DEEDS OF HEROISM. RUGBY, March 1. The President qf the Board of Trade announced in the House of Commons that in the Cwm colliery disaster 23 men were known to be dead and there was little hope of a further 28. Of 17 men entombed at Bilsthorpe, only three had been rescued. When the explosion occurred at the Cwm pit there were nearly 200 men in the workings. The explosion happened one and a half miles from the foot of the shaft. Many of the men managed to reach safety by themsual means, and 80 others were rescued, though many of these were gassed and a number were injured. Rescue work was carried on in the face of great danger. Mr. F. Hann, managing director of the Colliery Company, and Mr. L. L. John, miners’ agent, who were among the first to descend the pit, collapsed in the gas-filled galleries, and are now in hospital. Early this afternoon Government inspectors decided that rescue work must stop until the mine had been ventilated. Thousands of women, children, and relatives waiting at the pithead interpreted this order as sealing the doom of the entombed men. Doctors had been attending the injured at the foot of the shaft, but they had to come to the surface with the rescue parties because of the great danger from fire damp.

Heroic deeds were witnessed at the Bilsthorpe pit, but only three miners were saved, and hope for the lives of fourteen others is of the slenderest. Water is pouring into the shaft at the rate of 60,000 gallons an hour.—(British Official Wireless). HOPE ABANDONED. ENTOMBED MEN BEYOND HELP. (Received Wednesday, 7.30 p.m.). LONDON, March 2. Shortly before midnight the Cwm rescuers penetrated ono of the heaviest falls and reached a number of bodies, which will be raised this morning. Work continued all night, but there is not hope of any of the entombed men surviving.

In the House of Commons, after a statement by Sir Philip Cunliffe Lister (President of the Board of Trade) giving information regarding the mine disasters, one member exclaimed: “That’s your reorganisation schemel’’ Another shouted: “You are killing the miners!” Cries of “Oh!”—(A. and n.z:).