192 Mr. Buddie's Account of the Explosion in Jarro'w Colliery. 



The place here alluded to lies about 45 fathoms above the level of 

 the place where the explosion happened, and at more than the distance 

 of a mile from it, in an horizontal direction. 



The people working in the Slake district, although at so great a dis- 

 tance, and also in a distinct current of air and separate ventilation, 

 were alarmed by the concussion occasioned by the explosion. 



Messrs. Forster, Coxon, and Johnson's first care, after the atmos- 

 phere became tranquil again, was to collect all the men and boys in 

 that division into a group at the crane c, and to endeavour to conduct 

 them safely out-bie.* They proceeded down the fore drift with that in- 

 tention, and had only got as far as the point d, when they met with a 

 volume of dense hot smoke and after-damp, t which filled the drift from 

 top to bottom, and threatened to put a stop to their further progress. 



This satisfied them that the explosion had taken place somewhere in 

 the workings beyond the horizontal stone drift e e, and it was also but 

 too clear, that it must have proved fatal to all those who had been 

 within its range, and that their own lives depended upon their being 

 able to force their way through this deadly cloud. There was no time 

 for deliberation, they threw themselves down upon their hands and 

 knees, stuffed their handkerchiefs into their mouths, and scrambled 

 away with all possible expedition till they reached the point f, at the 

 foot of the inclined stone drift, a distance of 120 yards, where they 

 happily met the full current of fresh air from the bottom of the pit. 



Meeting with the current of fresh air at this point, satisfied them 

 that the ventilation had not been deranged any further out-bie by the 

 shock of the explosion, and encouraged them to hope that they might 

 still be able to save the lives of some of the people at the in-bie end of 

 the horizontal stone drift e e. 



As soon as they had recovered their strength by breathing the fresh 

 air, they began to examine into the state of the adjacent parts of the 

 mine. They found a dense volume of smoke and after-damp issuing out 

 of the north end of the horizontal stone drift e e, which was carried 



* Towards the bottom of the pit, in contra-distinction to in- bie, into the workings. 

 ■f A suffocating vapour produced by the explosion. 



