[ G\ ] 



XVII. On the Ventilation of Coal Mines. 

 By A Correspondent. 



1 HE frequent accidents that have lately occurred in the collieries' 

 in tlie neighbourhood of Newcastle and Durham, in consequence 

 of the inflammation of the carburetted hydrogen so abundant in 

 the coal-mines of those districts, have justly excited the attention 

 and sympathy of the public at large for the fate of the unfor- 

 tunate sufferers. 



It is extremely probable that the increase of accident arises 

 from a growing difficulty in ventilating the coal-mines as their 

 depth increases from the surface ; an evil which must be un- 

 avoidably increasing in all old coal-fielrls throughout the king- 

 dom. Unless, therefore, some radical mode of ciiculating an 

 abundant supply of pure atmospheric air be devised, so as to re- 

 place daily and hourly the gas as it becomes generated, these 

 explosions and ccncomitaht scenes of misery and distress are 

 more likely to increase than to diminish. 



Some severe censures have latelv appeared against the abilities 

 and judgement of the directors of the principal coal-mines of 

 the North. It is evident that these remarks have been ha- 

 zarded by persons otherwise highly respectable for talent, but 

 who seem little conversant with the practical details and diffi- 

 culties of one of these works. Strictures thus freely and indis- 

 criminately bestowed arc not likely to be productive of much of 

 that general benefit v/hich it seems the wish of all to obtain. 



Feeling with many others an earnest wish to diminish the 

 chances of that frigiitful calamity which hangs over the finest 

 coal-mines in the world, I submit to the public what seems to 

 me a probable remedv. 



Let every large colliery have an air-pit ; the place and situa- 

 tion of it in relation to the pumping or winding pit or pits, I 

 leave to the judgement of the viewer. In sinking, let the joints 

 and openings be i)roperly filled with mortar that will harden in 

 damp situations so as to make it as air-tight as possible. Near 

 to it place a steam-engine of about ten-horses power : this will 

 work an air-pump or cylinder of six feet in diameter with a 

 power of compression equal to half a pound upon the square inch 

 of the piston. Let the air-pump be placed in the mouth of the 

 air-|)it, and the apparatus so contrived as to produce an exhaus- 

 tion in the pit both in the ascending and descending stroke ; — 

 the mouth of the pit of course to fit close to the cylinder, to pre- 

 vent the air from passing inwardlv. 



If this engine travels at the rate of 200 feet in one minute, it 



will 



