The Eureka sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1902-current, 1911-03-11
THE INQUEST At TONOPAH
Inquiry Regarding Belmont Mine
Disaster Is Bringing Out De-
tails of the Tragedy

lne inquest Deing uelu reihtiNo W tuo
disaster in the Belmont mine at Tono-
pah, whereby II miners lost their lives,
is not yet ended. The Goldfeld News
says the first two days Of b inquest
were spent in technically examining
the sub-oficials of the Belmont Com
pany as to the mine workings. the vari-
GUS exits. safety and ventilating equip
ment, etc.. and also trying to fix re-
sponsibility for sending so many men
into the mine when 1t was a6re. Fri
day afternoon was spent in examining
the men who had gone underground to
fight the fire, and while some of the
men were not clear as to whose orders
they obeyed in going into the mine, the
balance of the testimony seemed to show
that the men were sent into the prop
erty rather than going down as volun.
teers.
The supervisors told a graphic story
of their struggle for life in the smoke
and gas filed workings of the mine, and
how. when they crowded onto the cages
to come to the surface men were over
come by the smoke and gas, lost their
balance only to be ground to pieces be-
tween the cage and the wall plates of
the shaft.
Some Of them told of shouts for help
and screams of despair coming from
comrades in various parts of the work.
ings.
One Of the men. John Pereti, told a
graphic story of his escape from the
1000 level after being nearly overcome
by the smoke. He had been with Mike
Hannigan, who lost his life. He tells
that the smoke was so dense that no
one could see and they merely had to
Rrope their way along. When he ar
rived at the 1000-foot station on his
way out of the mine he found the up
per cage full and three men got into
the lower cage. AS the cage started
men we're shouting and screaming for it
to be held until they could arrive, and
one man came charging through the
onOoNs Y ohO ot0tAOu Ooko WIN ~
head and fell. He was not seen again.
When the cage was hauled to the
top of the shaft Pereti says he shouted
that men we're dying on the 1000 and
100 levels. and fer them to send the
cage back to those levels. He did not
know whether this was done or not.
He knew that there were quite q num-
Der of men on the 100 level.
1t developed Friday that Eager Allen
had been to q dance the night before
the fire. and had been asleep in the
morning, only waking up in time to go
down and bring up one cage full of men
and to help the men off the last cage
that came up.
John Spencer. q miner who was in
jured. told of crawling to the cage and
finding it already filed with the pros
trate bodies of his companions. He
orawled over them and secured q grip
on the truss-piece Of the cage, standing
on their bodies. When the cage was
nearly to the top there was a crash and
n Of the men on whom he was stand.
ing was dragged from the cage and
crushed against the shaft plates. Two
more men went of the same way. The
engineer dropped the cage again and
then started IL mp and he was shaken
from his hold and fell to his hands and
knees on the floor Of the cage. There
were only Spencer and another man on
the cage when it reached the top.
The testimony goes to show that
Frank Burke, q dead shift boss. had
telephoned from the lower workings to
send the men down. and that Superin-
tendent Fitzgerald accepted this deci-
sion and then sent q large number of
men below, assigning certain duties to
to them.