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52 THE COAL TRADE BULLETIN.
Run mine was given insufficient attention by the
operating company or their employe whose duty
it was to enforce this law.
2. No report had been made by the night tire
boss on the outside of the mine for the benefit
of the night shift men, as is required by law,
Section 10.
3. The persons within the Rush Run and Red
Ash mines at the time of the first explosion, excepting
Hollie Jarrett, were there in violation of
the mine law, Section 10, wdiich says, in part:
"It shall be unlawful for any person to enter said
mine or mines for any purpose at the beginning
of work upon each shift therein until such signal
or warning has been given by said fire boss or
bosses, on the outside of said mine or mines as
to the safety thereof, ."
4. Finally, as to the ultimate cause of the explosion,
it remains to be learned by whom was
caused the initial explosion near the electric locomotive.
From all the evidence obtainable it appears that
the body of rescue workers was without organization
and not in control of any person in particular,
and for this reason their advance into the mine
was made without due caution for their own
safety.
Open lights were taken into the mine and only
two safety lamps were found with the rescuers.
The work of replacing the stoppings had progressed
as far in as the first crosscut beyond the
4th right heading wdiich was as far as the fresh
current of air had been conducted. Some distance
beyond this point at the Sth left entry, were
found the bodies of Thomas Bannister, fire boss,
and James Gwinn, and with them an open torch,
and about 75 feet beyond was found a safety lamp.
Within 100 feet of the 6th entry, on the main
entry, was found J. E. Phillips, lying partially on
his side and on a Davy safety lamp. This man
was about 515 feet beyond the cross-cut to which
the air-current had been conducted. It is quite
probable that Phillips had been overcome with
the afterdamp of the first explosion and was lying
on the floor of the mine wdien the second explosion
occurred, since the hair on the back of his head
was burned by the flame passing over him.
The force of this second explosion was not so
great as the first but it shot a flame out of the
mouth of the mine and destroyed all the brattices
consructed by the party of rescuers. Several per­
sons standing on the outside were hurled several
feet down the mountain side. As burning tim­
bers were found along the main entry after the
second explosion it is not known if that condition
existed as the result of the first or second explosion.
If, by the first explosion, then these burn­
ing timbers were a source of danger as much so as
an open torch. Either these burning timbers or
the open torches were responsible for the second
explosion.
The conditions which made this second explosion
possible are conjectural. The most plausible
theory is as follows: The first explosion consumed
practically all of the oxygen of the air
within the mine and a part of the finest dust.
Tiie heat from the explosion distilled the volatile
gas of the remaining coal dust. The resultant
gases of the explosion left the mine with a large
percentage of carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide
gases. The carbon monoxide and the gases
distilled from the dust would form an explosive
mixture along with oxygen furnished by the fresh
current of air. and in the presence of an open
light or a blaze the conditions would be favorable
for an explosion.
The fire found in the coal and gob in the second
left may have furnished some carbon monoxide
gas. Members of the rescue party who happened
to be on the outside of the mine at the time of
the second explosion have stated that a strong
current of air was passing in the main entry and
that a good current of air had been conducted as
far as the fourth right entry.
On the right side of the mine, the rescuers had
explored along the third right as far as the Old
Straight eight and found at this point that the
overcast was destroyed by the first explosion. The
point of ignition of the second explosion was most
probably on the main entry beyond the fourth
right entry, and caused either by the open torch
found at the fifth left entry or by a burning timber.
The regular fire boss of this mine, Mr. Ban­
nister, was with the party of rescuers and lost his
life.
Under the circumstances it was unwise for the
men to have taken open lights into the mine. Had
no open lights been taken into the mine it would
lie conclusive that a fire within the mine was responsible,
but the presence of the open lamp found
at the fifth left will forever leave this question unsolved.
No statutory law was violated in connection
wdth the second explosion.
The Somerset Coal Co. of Somerset, Pa., and
Baltimore has absorbed the Quemahoning Valley
Coal Mining Co., owning 1,750 acres of the cream
of the Jenner field, Somerset county, Pa. With
the new acreage acquired by the Somerset Coal
Co. that concern now controls 24,0t>o acres in the
Jenner-Quemahoning basin. The original hold­
ings of the Somerset Coal Co. in Somerset county
comprised 15.000 acres.