CHAPTER XVII
HOW SCIENCE AIDS THE STRICKEN COLLIER
Nothing is more characteristic of the present age than the care which is, quite rightly, expended upon the comfort and safety of those who do the manual labour of the community. The stores of scientific knowledge and skill are drawn upon freely for this end, and some very interesting examples can be given of the truly scientific methods which have been evolved, not only for preventing injuries of any kind, but for succouring those who may, despite those precautions, fall victims to disease or accident.
An example has already been given of the scientific investigation into the nature of colliery explosions and the best means of preventing them. We have seen there how expense has been poured out lavishly in fitting up the experimental gallery or artificial pit, and how the most cunning mechanical and electrical devices have been pressed into the service in order to find out just what happens when an explosion occurs. It has been related how these investigations have revealed with certainty the true cause of the explosions and thereby led the way to their prevention.
But with it all there is still an occasional disaster, occurring, sometimes, at the best and most carefully managed collieries. And therefore it is still necessary to provide for rescuing the unfortunate men who are affected.
It is worth remark, here, that colliery explosions are, all things considered, a very rare occurrence. Because of their dramatic suddenness, and the number of lives which are commonly lost in a single disaster, we are apt to magnify their severity in our minds and to picture the life of the miner as a very hazardous one. In point of fact, the expectation of life, as the insurance people call it, is quite as great among the coal-miners as among any class of manual labour. And of those who do meet an untimely end there are more lost through isolated accidents, involving one or two men, than in the great disasters.
To meet these isolated cases science is almost powerless. For the most part, they are due to falls of material from the roof of the mine, or some simple accident of that kind, caused by an error of judgment or lack of care on the part of fellow-workmen, and the only safeguard against such is the most careful and systematic supervision, which, in Great Britain at all events, is rigidly applied. The underground staff are very carefully organised with this end in view, and the whole is supervised by Government inspectors. No amount of scientific investigation or invention will help much in these matters.
With the explosion or fire, however, it is different, for there subtle forces and strange chemical influences come into play with which science is specially well fitted to deal.
To a great many people the first news of organised, trained and scientifically equipped rescue parties came at the time of the terrible Courrières disaster in France, when over 1000 men lost their lives. For then a party with apparatus hurried from Germany and played a prominent part in the rescue operations. But unfortunately the glamour of their performance was somewhat dimmed by the fact that after they had done all they could, and had gone home again, more men were rescued. Many, reading of that fact, were inclined to scoff at the "new-fangled" ideas, thinking that after all the old way of working with a party of brave but untrained and often ignorant volunteers was better than the new way of working with equipped and trained men. It certainly did seem as if the former had succeeded where the latter had failed. But that was quite a mistake, as subsequent events have shown, and in all probability it was due to the fact that the uninstructed party were local men, thoroughly familiar with the mine in which they were working, its geography and its special local conditions, whereas the trained men came from far away.