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Details of Event: Information from the Inspectors of Mines - 1925: Roof fall Cowdenbeath No. 10 Colliery, Fife.—At a junction, 30 yards from the face of a 3-ft. seam, three men were waiting for empty tubs when, without warning, they were buried under a heavy fall of roof. The fall, which extended up the slope road, measured 33ft long and and weighed about 40 tons. A heavy girder and nine bars were displaced. One man was killed instantly by the falling girder and another died before he could be extricated. The third man was severely bruised. The fall was probably caused by some side giving way and displacing one of the legs under the girder. The bars were needled into the road side and were not supported on legs. A junction is a place where special care in supporting the roof is necessary. The area of roof exposed is necessarily large and the exigencies of traffic prevent props being set under the bars for the whole width of the side road. The ends of the bars have to be supported by a carrying bar and, if this gives way, the whole erection collapses. In specially weak strata, as in this case, two girders of ample section might be set and the bars arranged so that a proportion of them was supported by each carrying girder, and each girder should be supported by two props at each end or else it should run over a wooden pillar built into the road.