Coal Mining R.I.P.


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As an ex NCB/BCC employee i agree with every thing Ayup says in #11. The NCB never made a profit, to pay a miner a decent wage nowadays the subsidy needed would be enormous.

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Typical shift, pack me snap, throw it in me snap bag, "see yer later Mam" Off out onto Kirke-White Street, get me a fag out of the packet, light it and cross Arkwright Street, ontowards Queens Drive,

I worked at Newstead and Annesley pits , 22 years in total. The job was hard and dangerous but it made you figure out any way to make it easier . The danger element taught you to be conscientious a

Strip away the sentiment and it was a wretched existence for men down the pit too. Pit closures were always going to happen. The way it happened was far too swift, it was far too brutal but it was in

Typical shift, pack me snap, throw it in me snap bag, "see yer later Mam" Off out onto Kirke-White Street, get me a fag out of the packet, light it and cross Arkwright Street, ontowards Queens Drive, finished me fag, turn left, light up again, won't be getting many more smokes for the next few hours, so build up me nicotine reserves!! Cross over Wilford Road, pit's in sight now, time for another smoke.

Pit gates, passed the canteen and walk through the door, medical centre on the left, through the doors and into the clean side lockers, say a few good days, strip off at my locker, 360 marked on it, my clock/lamp number. Walk through to the dirty side lockers, showers between them, some early riders getting showered.

Open me dirty locker, put me fags, lighter and snap on the long bench and get dressed in me pit rags, boots on, hat on and jacket on, gets "cow" riding the manrider down 15's main gate.

Through to the lamproom, pick me lamp up, check it works and sealed, slip it on my belt, pick me rescuer up and slip that on my belt too, nearly ten pounds hanging on my hips now, pick me two lamp checks up, one round that stays with me until the end of the shift, other square I hand to the banksman as I enter the cage.

Fill my water bottle up and hang that on my belt and off up to the electric shop to get my orders for the shift, time for a fag again, last two for several hours, have a chat, ahhh there's me chargehand, who sets me up for my shift with work. Almost manriding time, so light up me last fag, throw my ciggies and lighter in my surface tool box and lock it.

Quick check of my pockets for contraband and off to pit top.

Bit of a queue outside the airlocks time for giving someone a bit of a ribbing and chat about the work we have to get done.

Queues shrunk now and standing waiting to get on the cage, "ding, ding, ding" manriding signals, Banksman tells us to get on the cage, I hand him my square lamp check as I pass him. That's it now, he;s dropped the cage "door" chain link fencing, rung a two on the signals, winder lifts the cage a foot, Banksman releases the keps and we are off, getting darker and darker, nobody has their caplamps on yet, seems to be a ritual. We here the usual body noises but moving too fast to smell anything.......

Cage starts slowing, lights start appearing, we are coming into pit bottom.

Cage stops, Onsetter opens the gate then lifts the cage "door", and we get off.

A short walk passed the stables through the air doors and then the long walk down the Stone Head drift to the manriding station.

I'm on my way down to 51's this shift, been allocated as the districts electricians apprentice today. 51's is about 42 inches high, pretty good face and very little for us to do, unless we get a breakdown.

Nearly 3/4 of an hour gone already and we are on the manrider heading inbye at about 14mph, 20 minutes later we have arrived, walk a short distance turn right on 2's road and walk up a gentle rise to the top of 51's main gate, turn left and down the steep short drift, then a couple of miles of walking and thinking waht we will be doing when we finish our shift, about 15 minutes of walking and the noise gets louder, we are near the face now, we can hear the stage loader loading the gate belt with coal, the click click click of the belt joints hitting the rollers.

That's it for the next few hours, apart from inspections of equipment and any breakdowns that occur, so make ourselves comfortable on home mad seats, a bit of wood on a couple of blocks of wood.

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I think the English on the whole don't like the truth,as well as mining- other industries went to the wall; and the spin- offs and social consequences that have arisen subsequently are many fold.That disastrous Tory government fed and bore this..which has grew into a monster today!! DJ's Connextions thread..in my opinion is spot on..join all these pieces together and the jigsaw don't fit!!

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Until 1995(24th year) I hade a good well paid job at the Brush here in Loughborough.

I was only a storeman but was pulling about £12k a year the job went with many others on the MURDER" on the coal industry. :(

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I know someone who worked at the Brush factory, he was called Nigel Oram and another guy was Terry Johnstone............

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It is sad day, the end of a lifetime..............I came from Hucknall, a mining town, I had family going back to great, great grandparent's who were in the mines.............uncles, cousins, my father and brother too..............I can remember my dad coming home with his docket and throwing it on the table for my mother back in the 1950's, he was on the coal face and money was aplenty until he was buried when the shaft caved in and injured, that it when we became poor, but still we survived, I can never remember being, hungry, ragged or cold, (our house was always warm, those big coal fires in the front room and the living room are great memories for me)...........

People flocked into Hucknall from all over the British Isles to work in the mines there, the men worked hard and then went to the pub, the women gathered around each other to gossip, everyone always seemed to be happy...........Then everything changed, Pits all gone, no Community Spirit, no big coal fires to come home to when it's cold, no pit week holidays, Welfare's, where we had fun, all closed down and it was supposed to be for the better, but is it, I don't think so................ But saying that, the men in our family who worked in the mines all died with pit related illness's...................I can relate to ayeupmeducks's comments from the stories from my dad and brother when they came home from their shifts......we had to be extra quiet when they were on nights, or else.............

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Ayup, what a detailed and interesting account of life down a mine! I never realised you had to walk so far underground - didn't some people get claustrophobic? Just the thought of all that rock above me would make me feel bad. I have done the usual cave tours in Derbyshire and even then I felt a bit uncomfortable. We also went down the Big Pit in Wales and although it was interesting I was all the time longing to get out again. I sound pathetic I know - sorry... I really admire those who have done work like this in their lives.

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I've always thought that the Miners were the salt of the earth and doctors too............Now the Miners have all gone and I agree with MargieH, I could never had worked underground as I am very Claustrophobic.......I often wonder what would have happened to me if I had been a bloke instead of a women as I could not have gone to the pit like the men in my family.............

Did the pit ponies always stay underground, were they never brought up for air ?..........Poor things........................

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One face was around 6.5 miles from pit bottom......

Afternoon shift, we finished about 8-00pm, I dreaded working on 41's, at approx 6.5 miles from pit bottom, it usually meant a long walk at the end of the shift.

Around 2-00pm the coal prep plant?washery used to get overloaded, the two bunkers underground would take up some of the "slack" when coal winding stopped.

Come 5-00pm we were on fits and starts due to bunkers being full, eventually the coal prep plant would catch up and winding started again, then the bunkers had to be unloaded, which caused the prep plant to get overloaded once more.

Belts stopped, no more storage space, so the face teams would secure the faces, then it was the long walk out, no magic carpet, all full up.

Wouldn't have been so bad, but, 1's main trunk conveyor road wasn't just on one seam, it drifted down and back up in a couple of places, then the dreaded walk up the Stone Head Drift to pit bottom, 3/4 mile ALL uphill, ranged 1:4 to 1:6, my heart would be trying to escape through my ribs by the time I reached the top, then through the air doors and into number 1 pit bottom ready for manriding.

First place was the elctric shop where the first fag was inhaled in one suck!! Needed that nicotine fix BAD ...Hot cuppa, then down for a shower and the pub for a couple of well earned pints, err three, pints..Oh go on five pints then.....LOL

41's face at Clifton, finished the other site of Tollerton air field, all the roads went under the east side of West Bridgeford.

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There were only a few ponies during the 60's, they didn't get a lot of work, and were very well looked after. They were brought to the surface for the pit two week shutdown in summer, and spent two weeks of bliss, in fields on the south bank of the Trent.

We had one miner who suffered claustrophobia, I asked him how he managed, he told me it didn't bother him as it wasn't really a closed up space, but he panicked in small rooms. Remember roads were usually from 10ft x 12ft, 19 ft X 8ft, so they are really long tunnels, faces were about 280 feet long, so long low tunnels. I used to get nervous working in face developments, one way in, no way out until the drive broke through into the tail gate road.

They had 25 man limits in those headings.

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Ayup, was the long walk counted as part of your shift or was it extra? 6.5 miles would take well over an hour and a half. I am truly amazed at the things you have written about...

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Once we knew it would be a walk out, we allowed enough time to get to pit bottom for manriding times.. Electrical and fitting staffs were hourly paid, face teams were on contracts back then, so they lost money by not being able to cut coal...Just one of those things.

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Barclaycon #21

Here in Oz we are going down the same path. Not so much about coal, as yet, but in the future I am sure that steaming coal will be the first to suffer, metalurgical coal will continue as long as the need for steel continues.

Manufacturing is in its death throes, by way of an example, when I came to Oz in 1975 we could make every part of a car from tyres to roof panels and everything in between. With Ford ceasing manufacturing in 2016, followed by Toyota and General Motors Holden in 2017 we will be left with very little automotive manufacturing, if any.

The sad part about this is the loss of the skills (engineering, technical, and trades) that have been developed in this sector and the subsequent flow over into other sectors.

This will be at the cost of many thousands of jobs at the vehicle and engine assembly plants, many more down through the tiers of the supply chains and even to the humble cafes that provide lunch for the workers in many component plants.

Over the last few years we have reduced our oil refinery capability by 45% yet the brain dead numpties and their economic advisors are set to build more land vehicles and submarines for our defence capability. If ever we have a conflict we won't be able to fight anyone whist we wait for the tyres to come from China and the fuel to come from Singapore.

In order for sense to prevail we have to change the economic model that we use, if we were to calculate the total cost of some of these decisions not just the price then I am sure we would have different oiutcomes.

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Agree about walking up the drifts. At Hucknall the 1 in 5 Deep Soft to Black Shale intake drift had 2 coal/manriding belts, 1'st one from Black Shale to the Tupton/Low Main level where there was a cut through to the return drift, then a longer belt to the Deep Soft. Usually we rode up at end of shift so no probs, however when the bunkers were full or there'd been a breakdown we'd have to walk. We could walk up the return drift at 1 in 6 but it was warm & humid on there, so we usually walked up the intake drift as it was fresh air. It still made us puff & pant though. Eventually they put a 2 way top & bottom belt manriding conveyor in the return drift but it still used to conk out regularly..

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Ayupmeducks #36

I was brought up in a Nottinghamshire pit village and always remember that during the pit holidays the ponies were brought to the surface and let out into what was called the "pit field" to gallop around, eat fresh grass, and breathe fresh air. One of the ostlers told me that the ponies were very well looked after underground but I cannot imagine the experience of the poor ponies being put in a cage, being whisked upwards to the blinding light at the pit top and then being taken back down after two short weeks.

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Did the ponies have to have their eyes covered when they came out into bright sunshine? I had it in the back of my mind that pit ponies were blind.......can't be right, though can it?

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No, it wasn't that that bothered them, Margie, it was that they had grown too big for the cage and had to be dismantled and then put back together when they were at the top. Honest!

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We asked the same question about pit ponies treatment & was told straight away that they get the very best of treatment. Woe betide anyone who abused a pony.

Annual holidays their eyes were covered for a short tim to acclimatise (sp) ? to the light.

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