The Oil Drum

Nick:
The dramatic license of some of those who have written about historic mining can make it seem much worse than it actually was. Firstly, because of the geothermal gradient, as one mines down to any significant depth the mines became comfortably warm, rather than cold. Secondly since water was (and is) an issue it is drained away so that it does not interfere with most of the mining operations, so that the working area itself was (and is) generally dry. Dim it certainly was, and walking the ways back to the shaft in the dark after my light failed is something I still remember 40-some years later, but there was a lot of cameraderie and a sense of self-worth in those who worked there that should not be forgotten. The problems of coal dust were long neglected, as were other health and safety issues, but the damage done by the dust had little to do with uranium enrichment, somewhere in the back of my mind I seem to recall some early coal roof detection equipment that worked because of the emission from the overlying shale, because the coal didn't have any.

Unfortunately society was more concerned to get cheap energy than to worry about the conditions of those who produced it. As Barbara Freese pointed out their view of the industry and its workers has more often been tinged with comtempt than, for example, the more glamorous view of oil.