Single Record

Full Details

Surname

NUTT

Forename

Joseph

Day

25

Month

05

Year

1929

Age

Occupation

Miner

Mine/Quarry Name

Killochan

Mineral Worked

Coal

Owner

South Ayrshire Collieries (1928) Ltd

Location

Dailly

County

Ayrshire

Details of Event

Information from the Inspectors of Mines - 1929:  Falls of roof  At Killochan Colliery, Ayr, a miner was working at the road-head in a longwall place which had been cut by machine on the previous shift. The road had been brushed, also on the previous shift, to within 2 feet of the front of the coal.  There was one prop with lid set under the middle of the brushing edge and one between each pack and the line of face.  The stripping of the rise side coal had been completed, and the miner, before beginning on the low side was preparing to put extra supports to the brushing between the centre prop and low side because of the presence of lypes when a fall took place from between the lypes and injured him so badly that he died four days later.  The roof at a longwall roadhead is, from the nature of things, a weak point, and because of the shot firing when brushing it is shaken and often broken as well.  This accident would not have happened had it been the practice to cause brushers to strap the brushing lip parallel to the faceline before leaving it. As the seam was 4ft. thick a stell prop to the brushing front was also advisable.  In any event the brushing had been taken too close to the face, a practice which has been found to be fatal to the miners on following shifts on many occasions.