Page 55 - Serving on the Mine Rescue Team

ISSUE : Issue 31

Published by Ronald Caplan on 1982/6/1

During the disaster, they maintain contact with the mine manager, telling what they've found, requesting materials, receiving in? structions. The cloth symbolizes the boards and plaster of a stopping, a seal. Colin MacDonald, Glace Bay: What they usu- ally do, when they seal a place off, they put the testing pipes in, and they monitor that on a day-to-day basis, on a 24-hour basis. The idea of sealing a fire is to get rid of the oxygen content. If you have no oxygen, you have no fire. If the read? ings that they get from their tests show that a lot of oxygen's going into the area, that means a fire's still there. Then they start tightening up their seals, tighten? ing up their stoppings. They know they haven't got a tight seal. After, they mon? itor that. These things seem to be right. The oxygen is practically nil, the carbon monoxide is just about gone, and you get a high reading of CH , methane--it indicates to them the fire has now been extinguished, hopefully. After doing that, then in order to assess the situation, you must do it with a team of people. They leave travel- ways in those seals. They build them in a manner where you could allow a team to go in without disrupting the seal. Rudy Plichie: (While you were working, did you ever actually see fire?) Oh yes, I had seen the fire starting out. Methane burn? ing. The best way to describe it's some? thing like snake-like. You'd see it possib? ly 30 feet at one side, 20 feet possibly behind you, next thing you know it's in front of you, next thing you know it's in the back of you, A snake of fire, yeah. (Rudy, you didn't have to do this,) No, I volunteered, (To my mind, mining itself is a dangerous job. Why would you take on the added danger of being part of the drager crew?) Well, I'll tell you why, I was quite curious. As far as working in the mine at the time, I worked mostly on the walls, and my mining ability was just lim? ited to that. I was kind of curious. I was wanting to find out more about the ventila? tion end of it, and more than the basics. And I thought, in order to leam more than the basics of mining, you actually have to be a mine rescue. And I think I absorbed more at mine rescue in one year than the average miner can absorb in 10 years of mining. Because there, you learn all the different gases, what causes explosions, and what the results are. I really feel that the average miner can't visualize this. From the position I was in, in mining it- Chiropodist (Foot Specialist) '' ' ' PAULINE ERME 27 Tamarac Dr., Port Hawkesbury, N. S. 625-0404 I liest drive this magnificent motoring event EUROCAR SERVICE LTD. Westmoxmt, opposite Dobson Yacht Club 564-9721 located Rt 255,5 miles from Glace Bay Unn'g Port Morien 737-2408 Enjojr your fawrite Ideal Ice Cream Co. Ltd. A Complete Line of Frozen Foods Ice Cream and Fcxjntain Supplies 162 Prince Street 56if-4549 Sydney (55)

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