New Britain herald., 1923-01-26
HIGH DEATH RATE
 IN COAL INDUSTRY
i,s5O Fatalities Was the Toll Of
 Lives During 1922

Washington, Jan, ss,-ReRaFts res
 esiped by the United states bureau
 Of mines from state mine inspectors
 indicate that 1880 fatalities was the
 toll Of human lives eAaeted in the
 coal industry during 1888, This is a
 tentative figure hased on actual re-
 ports covering n months and an esii-
 mate for December based upon the
 probable output Of coal for the
 month. The estimate represents a
 reduction Of a fatalities from the
 total for 1891, but will nei represent
 lowering Of the death rate, In re.
 latian 10 the quantity Of coal pro-
 dueed, the accident rate will be aetur
 ally higher than for th: previous
 year the report said,
 In a summaFization Of the years
 record. bureau statistieians point out
 that from the first Of April to the
 last Of August a large part Of the
 industry was closed down on account
 of q miners strikci the production of
 fresh.mined anthracite was com
 pletely stopped; and the output Of
 soft coal was cut in half. This stop
 page naturally eliminated the acci-
 dents that would have occurred had
 inc mines been in operation, The net
 result. therefore, was that the five
 month period of the strike showed an
 ahnormaliy low number Of fatal acc
 cidents. and this reduction will. Of course. he reflected in the total num- Der Of fatalities for the year.
 Reduction Not Large.
 fThH Frdtlafipn n 1ngs 0f life ,lp- spite the strike shutdown, was not as large as it might have been be- cause Of the large number Of lives lost during the year by mine eyplo- sons. The outsta anding feature of the mine year was what the bureau officials call ma aior" disasters. acci- | dents in which at least five lives were i lost. There were l3 Of these during the year. il Of which were explosions | which together cost the lives Of 2sl | men. During 1921 there were only | five major accidents. with loss of ! S4 lives. Only three of these were i mine explosions and they resulted in only 21 deaths. The largest killed Ii | men: the largest during the past year exacted S7 lives, while another took 77.
 On the basis of number of fatali- ties per million tons of coal mined, the death-rate from gas and dust eX- plosions in 1921 was only 233. while for the first II months of 1922 it was .731. more than three times the rate for the previous year.
 The records of the past six or seven years had furnished grounds for the hope that the coal mining in dustry was no longer to experience the terrible explosions Of gas and dust which formed so distressing part of the industry's record in earlier years, the statisticians de- clared. For many years the bureau of mines and other agencies have been endeavoring to find ways. not only to stop them altogether, but also when they occur to stop them from travelling through the entire mine, destroying everything in their path.
 Proper ventilation to prevent dan eerous accumulation of gas; wetting the mine to allay dust; the use of rock dust to obstruct the progress of e. 'losons; and other safety meas ures have been investigated and de- vised. Yet in the face of what would seem to be adequate knowledge of the subject, and sometimes apparently in spite of intelligent precautions. an < explosion occurs, causing the loss Of many lives and bringing destruction to property.
 However, the grave loss of lives in the mines is not entirely attributable to explosions, it was declared. Less E than 10 per cent of the fatalities arc caused by explosions; nearly 90 per cent result from rock and coal falls. The carelessness of the miners them selves and their dsincination to give time to take precautions against the falls are given as the reasons for that E fact. Such accidents usually claim their victims one or two at time and they are attended by none of the j. spectacular features that characterize E 8 large explosion. But it is found at o the end of the year that if falls of mated nearly half of the lives lost mated. nearly half of the lives lost 5 in mine accidents could have been saved.
 The loss during the ii months of lSsz EeSulteu III lot deHtHS, or dL d rate of 1,930 per million tons, as with a rate of 2,012 for H 1921. An examination of mining rec 1rds over d long period discloses lit- le if any improvement in the record of this class of mine accidents. For this lack of improvement" he report stated. 'it is perhaps fair 0 place the larger part of the re. 'ponsibility upon the miners them elves. They are continually at the working place where most Of the falls occur, and are best able to observe he conditions under which they @ york and to tell when rocks should ,c taken down or props put up. A @ miners natural desire, however, to H increase his earnings through larger onnage and his disinclination to take town rock or put up a prop when "a eeded, have been the cause of many 3 eedless deaths and injuries in coal nines."