The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-06-17
ID GUARD COAL MINER. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY TO Make Tests of Various Ex- plosives A Miniature
 Mine to be Built.

Determined endeavors to stop the sacrifice of human lives in the coal mines of the United States are to be made at once by the fuel division of the geological survey, says a Washing ton special to the New York Times.
 Plans have been drawn for an experi- mental station where tests of dyna- mites and powders used in blasting will be made to determine their safety in the presence of fire damp and coal gas. Explosives of all sorts will be hurled by means of mortar into a mammoth boiler plate cylinder preyi- ously filled with gas, and the effects will be noted. If ignition falls after severe test the explosives will be known as permissible explosives" and their use urged upon mine owners.
 There will be experiments in rescue work One part of the station will be fitted as Q miniature coal mine and miners and operators taught how to save lives. In gas explosions hun dreds of lives could be saved were 1t possible for the rescue party to enter immediately after the accident Fire damp often holds the men back for hours while their comrades are slowly being suhAcated or burned to death,
 The government experts have found an apparatus in Europe which enables the rescue party to enter any place where's there Is gas. The miniature mine will be filled with dense smoke, and practical demonstrations with this apparatus will be made.
 J, A. Holmes, chief of the technology branch of the geological survey, says;
 There seems to be no end of gas and coal dust explosions. Instead of grow ing less, these horrors appear to be multiplying. In 1906 the coal mine death roll in Pennsylvania was 500, and 250 died as the result of gas or coal dust explosions.
 ''The United States is behind Europe in safeguarding the lives of the men in the mines. England and Belgium, where the mines are notoriously full of fire damp, have had for years experi- mental stations, and in these countries there are but few casualties in the mines.
 There are a number of permissible explosives in England, and these only may be used. In England also the limit charge which must not be ex- ceeded, is employed. Few of the states here have such regulations"
 Coal dust rather than gas causes large number of explosions. Officials of the geological survey have been watching the frequently recurring ac- cidents in different parts of the coun- try. Some of the recent mine explo- slons In one state West virginia-are as follows:
 Red Ash, March 6, 1GoO 100 killed.
 Rush Run, March 1e, 1905, 2l Killed.
 Bluefcid Coal. Dale mine, Jan. {. 19Os, 22 killed.
 Paint Creek, Detroit mine, Jan. IS, isOs, IS killed.
 Fayette county. Parai mine, Feb. 8, 1906, p killed.
 Phillippi Century mine, March s, 1905. 26 killed
 Fayette county, Stuart mine. Jan, a. i907 S2 killed.
 Fayette county, whipple mine, May l. 1907, 1 killed,
 The cylinder into which the explosive will be fired is to be made of heavy boiler plate. Safety valves will be placed along the top and left unfasten- cd, so that when there is m explosion they will fly open. A series of port holes on the side covered with one-haif Inch glass will enable those conducting the experiments to witness the explo- sions from the observation house sixty feet away, from where the steel nor tar will be fired.