NEWS AND NOTES 



379 



To Save Miners' Lives 



Four stations for the training of miners in 

 rescue work have been established recently 

 by the big coal companies of the country and 

 several more are in contemplation. This is a 

 direct outcome of the demonstrations in res- 

 cue vifork being made by the United States 

 Geological Survey, Technologic Branch, at 

 its experiment station in Pittsburg, Pa., and 

 at the subrescue station in Urbana, 111. 



"The fact that these stations have been es- 

 tablished is gratifying to the Geological Sur- 

 vey," said Director George Otis Smith "It 

 shows the operators and mine owners are tak- 

 ing interest in this humane movement, and it 

 is bound to result in a decrease in the num- 

 ber of deaths in the mines. The sole pur- 

 pose of the Government in taking up this 

 work was to demonstrate its usefulness. It 

 is not the intention to make the rescue sta- 

 tion work permanent. 



"Perhaps the most complete of these pri- 

 vate stations is that of the Frick Coke Com- 

 pany, which employs 30,000 men. The station 

 has been erected at the Leisingring mine, 

 near Connellsville, Pa., in easy reach of all 

 the Frick company's mines. There is a corps 

 of six men being trained in the use of the 

 oxygen helmet, a device that admits artificial 

 breathing for two hours in the most deadly 

 gases known. In order that the men be given 

 practical experience in the use of these hel- 

 mets, a part of the station has been devoted to 

 an air-tight room which is filled with gases 

 that will not support life. The men are being 

 given a daily drill in this gas-filled room and 

 are gaining confidence in the use of the hel- 

 mets. Within a short time, the corps will 

 visit the Government experiment station at 

 Pittsburg, where the members will be given 

 further instructions by the Federal experts. 



"Whenever a disaster occurs in any of the 

 Frick company's mines, the rescue corps will 

 respond at once and will immediately enter 

 the mine for the purpose of bringing to the 

 surface miners who have been injured or are 

 tmconscious from the efifects of gases. With 

 these helmets, the rescuers can enter any gas- 

 filled mine where it would be sure death for 

 the miner to go. In many disasters the men 

 fortunate enough to be outside of tlie mine 

 when the explosion occurred have had to re- 

 main at the surface for hours, waiting for the 

 ventilation to drive the gases out, knowing all 

 the time that their comrades were dying." 



Other rescue stations have been established 

 at Fairmont, W. Va., at the Marianna 

 mine in Pennsylvania, where 150 lives were 

 lost last November, and at Zeigler, 111. 



Mr. J. W. Paul, who has charge of the res- 

 cue work for the Government, left Washing- 

 ton recently for Europe, where he will study 

 rescue work at the European stations. "In 

 the short time we have been operating we 

 have saved the lives of six men," said Mr. 

 Paul, "and if we did nothing more, the results 

 would warrant everything that has been done 

 6 



so far by the United States in trying to re- 

 duce the accident death rate in the mines. 

 But I am satisfied more good will come from 

 our efforts. The four stations just estab- 

 lished will be the means of saving the lives of 

 many miners ; and we all know, many a poor 

 fellow, imprisoned in a mine filled with the 

 dread fire-damp, has lived in agony for hours 

 before he died. I understand that the oper- 

 ators are to establish many more stations." 



i^ va ^ 



Mississippi's Rank in Naval Stores Production 



Mississippi held fourth place among the 

 states figuring in the naval stores industry 

 last year, outranking Louisiana, North Caro- 

 lina, South Carolina, and Texas. The three 

 leading states were Florida, Georgia, and 

 Alabama. The states making the most 

 marked advances in the production of naval 

 stores last year were those using improved 

 methods in turpentining, and it is safe to 

 predict an even better showing in Mississippi 

 when the cup and gutter and the cup and 

 apron systems are used more widely. 



The production of more than 36,500,000 

 gallons of turpentine and more than 4,000,000 

 barrels of rosin, with a valuation of more 

 than $14,000,000 for the turpentine and nearly 

 $18,000,000 for the rosin, summarizes the 

 output of the naval stores industry for all 

 states in 1908, according to the preliminary 

 report of the United States Forest Service 

 just completed. The study was provided for 

 in a special appropriation of $10,000 by Con- 

 gress and the report contains the most com- 

 plete and accurate statistics ever gathered 

 for the naval stores industry in this country 

 and covers the production for both 1907 and 

 1908, giving comparative figures for the two 

 years. 



Of the eight southern states, each produc- 

 ing more than 200,000 gallons of turpentine 

 and 25,000 barrels of rosin, Florida leads 

 the list with 17,030,300 gallons of turpentine 

 in 1908 against 15,572,700 gallons in 1907, and 

 1,932,114 barrels of rosin in 1908, against 

 1.774.370 barrels in 1907. 



Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, 

 North Carolina, South Carolina, and Texas 

 follow in the order named. The comparative 

 report of the production by states is as fol- 

 lows : 



36,589,000 4,288.283 34,180,800 3,999,321 



