NEW COAL MINE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 November 1938, Page 4

NEW COAL MINE

OPENED UP BY STATE NEAR GREYMOUTH.

YIELD OF FIVE MILLION TONS ANTICIPATED.

(By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON. This Day

After preliminary work, which has lasted about two years, by 100 men at a cost of about £lOO,OOO, coal has been struck at the new State mine at Nine Mile, near Greymouth. It is estimated authoritatively that the mine will yield' 5,000,000 tons of coal.

Boring operations have disclosed 15 feet of clean coal from the floor to the ceiling at a point 450 feet below the ground level. The new mine is expected to be brought into production about Christmas this year, and a daily output of 500 tons will be aimed at. It will later replace the James State mine, which is nearby and which is almost worked out.

Coal in the new mine, which has not yet been named, has been proved to be excellent for domestic use and for steam purposes.

Access to the new mine is from a side road leading from the GreymouthWestport coastal road at Nine Mile, but the output of the mine will ultimately be deposited at the railhead in Rapahoe, through part of the old workings.'of the James mine. Stone, drivers are being constructed by cooperative parties on contract to make easy the transport of coal from the mine to the railhead. These, it is expected, will be ready for use in March next year. .