Hearing that the men who had finally made it out of the nightmare were willing to immediately jump back into the fray to try to rescue their friends is one of the most heartening things I’ve ever heard.
People back then were real people. Nowadays, no way. Maybe a few people. Of course you'd never get anyone to do that job these days in the first place.
Hearing that several miners had survived WW1 only to be embroiled in this reminds me of a story of one of my great-great uncles. He'd been conscripted from the slate quarries in North wales to fight in the war. However, due to his literacy level he was made a company / battalion clerk - one day his company commander, a young Lieutenant, was making conversation and asked my uncle what he was going to do when the war was over. "I'll probably go back to the quarries sir." he replied. "Ah, the offices?" said the officer. "No sir, the quarry face." The officer then turned to my Great, great uncle and told him, that he was a bright chap and that if my great great uncle wanted, he could get in touch with his family and arrange a job for him in the family business's offices. At the end of the war, both men survived unscathed, my great great uncle returned to the quarry face. However, about a week later a letter arrived from his former company commander. He apologised for taking so long to get in touch but it had been tricky to find him and that the job offer was still open if he wanted it. My Uncle did take up the position and rose through the ranks. Looking at the list of deaths & injuries in the quarry, it looks like that officer probably saved his life.
That is a super interesting story! I noticed as I got older (into my 30s and 40s) my heritage and where I came from became a more interesting topic to pursue. I don't know how old you are, but it is never too late to start. It would be really interesting to find out who this officer was because you might not be here typing had he not looked up your greatie greats. It is wild to think about and fully comprehend all the wild stuff that had to have taken place for you to be here, but your greatie great definitely sounds like a man who lived a very full life. PS: Ahhh your greatie great uncles ... So perhaps you'd still be here regardless. Still interesting though!
The story of literally every mine disaster: "Things were incredibly shitty, dangerous, and falling apart from neglect. The mine workers complained to management for years, but since replacing it cost money the mine owners decided it was instead better to _not_ repair anything and instead buy themselves a sixth wing for their mansion as well as the Pacific Railroad to complete their set. Then, suddenly, the thing everyone had been warning them about for years happened and a whole bunch of people died. After an investigation by the government, the mine owners were fined $12, which they declined to pay. No changes were made and the mine continued to operate in the same fashion for the next 50 years."
Fun fact: If the concept of a manlift interests you from an enginerring standpoint, there us a fully functional one called Fahrkunsten that is demonstrated to tourists in the Silver mines in Kongsberg, Norway. This one originally went down over 900 feet, and was in partial operation until the 1930's. If you visit these mines, you can take a mining train in to some 1000 feet under ground, to visit machinery, Fahrkunsten, shafts and holes, fairly large mountain halls used for mine workers living under ground for weeks at a time, and have a glimpse down the largest of the shafts, that is as deep as 3000 feet from surface to bottom. The Silver mines themselves sprawl across a whole mountain with a multitude of large and deep day openings. There's also a mining museum that is well worth the visit. I'm not certain if its the only remaining manlift, but I'm sure its one of few in the world. It really is a sight as the guides step onto a small platform not much larger than a chair seat, holding on to a steel handlebar, then see the whole massive linked wood beam lift into the air, then step over to a meeting platform on the twin manlift and so forth. Nothing below them but a few hundred feet of shaft. Gives you a certain respect for those who worked the mines. The Kongsberg Silver mines operated for over 300 years.
You can see "Fahrkunst" in Germany as well: Museum Grube Samson, St. Andreasberg, Harz Mountains and Bergbaumuseum „Lautenthals Glück“, Langelsheim , for example
@@silviamtz8961 More often than you'd think. In my podunk, I remember a guy coming out the wrong end of a wood mill "hog" (in ear-sized pieces). Rumor later had it he & his son-in-law, who worked it with him, had argued the day. Remember that old quote, "What evil lurks in the hearts of men?". We can _never_ know.
@tyler7711 oh trust me, many places in America still operate that way. In management's eyes, it's only a problem once enough people die, and even then they only really care once it affects their bottom/people raise a fuss about it. Over a 100 years later and the people up top still see the working class as nothing more than wage slaves and peasants.
The workers were the ones putting all the effort in- the management were the ones neglecting a much needed upgrade to a new system, with replacements just being to fix stuff after it broke. One cared, the other couldn't "afford" to care.
@@tyler7711 now we half-ass both the maintenance and the inevitable rescue efforts! (I don't disagree with modern protocols that offer more protection to first responders on principle, but combined with the rampant negligence for most workers' safety it does say something about whose lives get valued)
@@Findecommie Aww come on now, how can a mine make money by spending it?? I'm an old oil and gas guy, and yeah, I get the mentality of these companies. The whole 'we care about your safety!' is BS. What they really mean is, 'don't fall into that vat, you'll ruin the batch and it will cost us millions in lost product and court fees.'
This is exactly how modern corporations would treat everyone if they could still get away with it. They are ruthless, reckless, and utterly without morals. Bravo on the insurance company for being uncharacteristically decent and paying out.
@@apocratos0174The conversation is far more nuanced than that, but companies that have a fiscal responsibility to return profit to shareholders, are structurally designed to behave in a way that is parasitic, deleterious to employees, and bad for society at large. As for socialism, when you're spending other people's money - taken under force of law, accountability is low, bureaucracy, waste and corruption are high. But they are polar extremes, not the only choices. But I'm sure that you already considered all that?
My great grandfather worked in the Red Jacket mine in Calumet Michigan in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s . He testified before the Michigan Supreme Court and helped change laws to allow better conditions for miners and all working people after he watched his friend be crushed to death. I read the transcripts. My great grandparents were also there at the Italian Hall Disaster in 1913. They were Serbian but there were many other ethnicities there because it was going on during the strike and many people were killed. Horrific things happened back then and they are going to happen again. Learn your family history so you never forget where you came from and who you are.
In the Upper Peninsula of Michigan there were two sister mines separated by a basin. they were connected by a tunnel. Blasting occurred regularly, and one day in the Barnes-Hecker mine, a blast poked the basin open, causing insane pressure change followed by instantaneous flooding. The mine was 600 feet deep, and like the mine in this video, the only way up was by a ladder. Two men scrambled as fast as they could up the ladder as rushing water licked at their feet. The sounds of screams and crashing below them. Wilfred Willis, a 23 year-old man was able to scale all 600 feet in 15 minutes. The man underneath him on the ladder was not so lucky. Willis would be the only survivor of the accident and had to be revived using smelling salts when he collapsed on the surface. 52 men died in that mine. The sister mine adjacent to Barnes-Hecker received knee-deep water through the tunnel that connected the two. Bodies could be seen washing into the mine through that tunnel. It is now sealed and fenced off, serving as an underground tomb to the lives lost. There are also heartbreaking stories of some those who died. Men on their last day, others on their first. The surviving families still don't like to talk about it to this day.
@@nickkohlmann I highlighted "Barnes-Hecker mine," right clicked, and selected "Search google." November 3rd, 1926. This kind of shi* is altogether too common in human history, and many of the very people who would pay these prices for profit seem to be eager to return to those days.
Some of them knew immediately they were done for even though they hadn't actually taken their last breath yet. Terrible only one soul survived. The guilt. The terrible terrible guilt.
I did kinda roll my eyes every time that was brought up, because, they're working under the ocean. It's nicknamed 'the mine under the sea'. Obviously everyone's first priority and the first danger they think of is going to be the ocean. There would be plenty of precautions taken against that, and way less against other, less obvious dangers.
The ocean is a heavy thing, and rocks are strong things, the ocean is not heavier than rocks, they dug deep enough so that the ceiling wouldn't collapse, water couldn't get in there, at least not that much.. There was probably high humidity there, since they burned candles without fear of an explosion, lol..
I live in Cornwall, it was a huge part of our heritage, I have nothing but admiration for these miners. Gevor Mine has a brilliant exhibition with genuine tools, machinery, and tunnels to explore, well worth a visit
And a perfect display for the current wokies talking about 'white privilege'; most western countries were built on the blood, sweat and tears of backbreaking work like this, and our forefathers fought hard to improve those conditions.
as horrifying as these incidents are, the fact that so many people are willing to drop everything to put themselves in danger to try and save the lives of strangers brings a tear to my eye. restores little hope in humanity.
@@EmpressOfExile206 No, he said hundreds came from nearby towns and other mines to help with the rescue. Are you dumb? The East Pool Mine is 25 miles away which back then would've taken an entire day just to travel
As I mining engineer I've worked the gold and platinum in South Africa and the coal in Northumberland. The Levant disaster, bad as it was, wasn't the worst by a long chalk. The New Hartley disaster took 204 men, some only 10 years old - and set mining law to insist on two points of egress from underground workings. The Levant miners benefited from this. Senghenydd coal mine in Wales took 439 men after methane ignition followed by coal dust explosion. Accidents in the mines are always nasty because you're remote, and its dark. Pulling dead bodies out of confined spaces is something I can't recommend, but men still do it.
Heroes, who suffered and died so that we could live the easy, safe lives we have today. And they were labelled by the owners and right-wing politicians as trouble makers and commies. And even today, people like Elon Musk would do away with many of these regulations because it hinders productivity and profits...
I live a five minute walk from the burial ground of the Hartley pit disaster. It’s absolutely devastating and gut wrenching reading the names of those children who died in the disaster. My ancestors also worked in the coal pits, it’s important to remember them and their sacrifice
god you are so freaking good at telling these stories, perfect pronunciation and enunciation. but most importantly you tell these stories of the past with so much respect, knowing full well that all those affected were fully human with dreams, families, and its just so refreshing to see someone cover these disasters as they really are: horrific.
It frankly amazes me when people talk about “the burden of regulation” and “too much oversight ”…if corporations could be trusted to do the right things, we wouldn’t have had to enact laws in the first place. These videos will give people an idea of what it was like when businesses were able to do what they pleased.
It got labeled an "accident" to remove liability from the company--of course it did. What a joke. And people thought companies cared about them back then. They never did and they never will. It's really sad that worker protection laws primarily exist because of events like this. :/
Of course they did not care. A good example are the candles. Back then candles were made of animal fat, and when times were tough, miners when starving, would start eating the candles. When the companies got wind of this, they started poisoning the candles to stop them eating them.
My uncle took me to an abandoned mine in BC once and we looked up a crack in the rock to see all the floor levels above - it’s truly mind bending how massive some mines can be
@@funonvancouverisland second deadliest mine explosion in Canada too unfortunately, No. 1 Esplanade mine explosion. 150 men lost their lives back when Nanaimo had like 3,000 people. There are almost no videos about it.
You think these jobs still don’t exist? Our wonderful Godly western countries just moved these “jobs” to poorer countries and use them as slaves for our benefit. That is how capitalism actually operates. At the end of the day, it’s about maximizing profits, no matter the cost of life. That is why capitalist love de-regulating everything. Hurts us while making them billions. Very demonic.
They used to teach us about the Cornish mines in school when I was a kid, we even had a school trip to Morwellham Quay which was pretty cool. They told us a story about one of these mines where they had mined into a cavity about a mile out to sea, so large their most powerfull lamps couldn't see any surface inside. Most of these mines have been left to nature now, but you can still see the ruins all along the southwest coastal paths.
cringe lmao. Unions were not even legal back then, at least not in the same context they are today, nor was there any legislation regarding it. You have probably not even worked in a union environment
@@BM-rm9zyActually unions were legalized in 1871 in England and were the driving force behind shorter working hours and improved safety standards (as well as improved pay) throughout the end of the 1800s and afterwards.
I live down the road from Levant Mine, in Cornwall. This county has an old and very ancient mining history, and the legacy from these mines are still to this day causing many issues to the public, and local flora and fauna. I work as an aerial survey engineer and have been in the past tasked with mapping and modelling surface expressions of the mining legacy, such as collapsed shafts and instability issues with former mine workings. It's really great to see this on youtube!! Add: I have been very lucky to have accessed an old abandoned Cornish mine still in its original state prior to its abandonment. I tell you this, its cramped and very sketchy maneuvering around the mine. It's nothing like your modern mines.
As a mine explorer, I know what you are up against, with many mines closed before 1880's and never to grace a map. The Cornish Great Flat Lode has thousands of shafts trying to extract the minerals.
I was the possibly the last person to visit the underground in Levant. The working were linked in to Geevor mine underground, which closed in 1987 and as a member of a local mining group, we were given permission to enter the mine via ropes. The mine was flooding at at a rate of 6ft per day, so we have a window of a few month to get down to the 40 Backs before it was lost forever. I still vividly remember the haul train that was left in situ, with no way to recover it. The 40 Backs was a very scary place, where you could here the sea above, knowing there was hundreds of feet of water above. When we left the mine, I was last to climb the rope, making me potentially the last person down the mine. I visited the shaft a few years back and this flooded right up. This was the shaft in the sea cliff, not the engine shaft with the beam engine, which has now restored by the Nstional Trust.
Yep, I've been in the union my whole career , 33 years so far. The only negative basically about unions is that eventually they get a little out of control and too demanding, losing sight of the core reasons that unions were created in the first place...
I cannot imagine how awful it must have been to work in these conditions. It defies belief that people had to work like this in order to just make a simple living.
Donkin Mine in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia is currently the only operating sub-sea coal mine in the world. The area is no stranger to sub- sea mines (or disasters!) having had many over the 250+ years of coal extraction. The longest was nearly 8 km from shore! Thanks for this episode. Very informative.
An entire branch of my family tree is from Cornwall, and knowing that tin mining was the dominant industry, it's horrifying to think about how many of my ancestors endured these conditions.
Having to work a job like this, out of desperation that otherwise you would not be able to feed yourself and your family, is truly one of the greatest injustices of humankind. The tragic disaster is just the cherry on top of a far greater tragedy: the fact that they felt they needed to be there in the first place, because that is how society is/was ordered.
Cornishman here. Good content, and thanks for bringing this to the worlds attention again. I think a little more mention of the solidarity of the Cornish Miners and their caring and social attitude would have offset the description of the work conditions, but its true it was very hard work. Kernow bys vyken, glory to the Cornish hard rock Miners, past and future ;)
There’s a saying: Regulations are written in blood. It means regulations are usually only implemented after something terrible (e.g., an accident) has happened. It seems to be human nature to only deal with something afterwards, not before.
The little history lesson before the talk about the disaster was as interesting, if not more than the actual disaster. I really enjoyed learning about the conditions people worked in back then. This was a great video, very well put together.
I live in Cornwall and I have been to Levant and this story I have heard so many times, she's 1 the 4 main mines, the others, Geevor, Botallack and Crofty. Keep up your amazing work 😁
I also live in Cornwall and me and my old housemate went last year to visit it, my old housemate worked as a miner in Crofty as a driller and he told me that there was a disaster at levant but I didn't know it was this, which costed so many lives 😢
All of us subscriber's are guilty, we are curious humans, it's in all of our DNA, I don't apologize for being a human being, The Judge above all Judges made us this way, the brain, common earthly sense, the gift of knowing right from wrong, that's how we evolve and learn to get to Sit With That Judge Above All Judges...it's that simple, just like the books it comes from!!!🙏🐲🌅🥰
Humans are naturally scared of death cause no one can tell us how it ends just how it begins and unfortunately, it’s like this! Even with walking next to Jesus it can be scary! We are taking the word of a book that is over 2000 years old. Written by poor people that were also scared of death…
Tragedy happens to all at some point or another in life, it's how you respond to it that makes a difference. This life is but a breath, eternity is forever.
@@jackjeffery1536 Everyone has mental limits. Some extraordinary circumstances push people beyond them, and they snap or break down. Literature that has survived for thousands of years accounts for modern things like PTSD, for instance Assyrian soldiers diagnosed with "the ghosts of your enemies haunting you" or the biblical story of Elijah who suffered from depression and suicidal ideation.
@@jackjeffery1536 The Bible also records Paul telling Timothy to "take a little wine for thy stomach's sake," which tells us that God approves of human-made medicines and cures. The Psalms often make reference to healing balms, usually comparing them to Scripture, which would imply that both are good things. Now, if the stomach is one organ of the body, and the brain is also an organ of the body, reason follows that using medicine for the brain would be not only permitted but _encouraged_ by Scripture. Furthermore, regarding mental health, I specifically mentioned Elijah above because in that passage God tells Elijah to 1) "rise up," and 2) "eat and drink," which are two things that people diagnosed with chronic depression tend not to do, and this sedentary behavior tends to become a cycle which worsens the depression. All of the above can be described simply as knowing that "your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost," and being a good steward of that temple.
I'm from the UK, and have never heard of this incident. The one I think most people here remember is the Aberfan disaster, which was above ground, but the direct result of coal mining.
Ive been following this channel for 3 years now and you're by far my favorite storyteller. You don't add too much fluff and convey scary parts of the stories you tell in a matter of fact way that makes it both easy to understand and getting the direness across in these stories. Keep up the good work.
Crazy that the disaster happened almost 100 years after the mine originally opened in 1820! Generations of miners performing probably the most dangerous work on the planet yet their safety was so neglected. Thank you for bringing this story to light.
I work in the mining industry and we always say that rules and regulations are written in blood. Its dark but true. We can work safely today because we learn from events like this, tragic as they are. Wild to see how far things have come.
Same here. What type of mine? I have worked for 2 years in an underground iron mine in northern Sweden. It is like a small city there about 1,6 km under the mountain.
If you have never been down a mine - or cave - you have no real idea of something like this. It is not just dark - you can see NOTHING. No light AT ALL. Yes, if there is any accident or worse, miners will stop to help out and rescue where they can. They know it may be their turn next.
“Gly”: As an abandoned mine explorer that documents abandoned mines for TH-cams “Abandoned and Forgotten Places”, I can attest to the difficulty of climbing ladders up and down vertical shafts. It is an exhausting and grueling task and I can’t imagine climbing 600 - 1000 feet of ladders before and after your work shift prior to the invention of elevators. These men were tough as nails and deserve all the respect history can give them.
And miners had to go on strike to get paid for their time getting to and from the face. Here in Kent, we had mines up to 1,000m deep, with workings that went out under the sea for a mile or more, and the men weren't paid for all the time it took then to get to and from the face.
I recall going to the national coal mining museum on a school trip in yorkshire. Even as a kid I was blown away with just how long the lift took to reach the bottom. Even the torch & lamps they gave us were heavy af. My grandad worked in the mines & had some horror stories despite the saftey imrpovements,
Changes made by the British government in the 1980's have lead to an almost 100% safety record here, no miners have been killed or injured for a very long time. What were the changes? They just closed all the mines down, can't get hurt if there isn't any mines.
Yeah, here in the southern parts of the US, we just switched to open face mining. Instead of digging mines, they just cut the entire top of a mountain off and then dig a big open pit. They're beautiful 😒😡😫
And people wonder why there are unions and industrial regulation... Leaving aside the horror of this story, those photos were fascinating. If any of the miners saw them it would have been the first time they'd ever seen their true working conditions, or what the mine actually looked like. I visited a disused quarry in Wales many years ago, and as part of the underground tour, they turned out the lights, so that the only illumination came from a few 'candles' dotted around the huge chamber we were in. The effect was truly shocking, suddenly you could only see the few metres illuminated by each candle, you had no idea of the size or geography of the chamber. The fact that men dug the slate out of that quarry by hand and explosives, with few, if any, of the protections we take for granted now, and in, practically, pitch dark, is beyond astonishing. Next time someone mockingly says "bloody health and safety!" to you, remember this.
I am glad you emphasize the importance of legislation for the safety of things. It scares me how people genuinely want to remove it instead of addressing flaws because they weren't around before legislation to live with the risk and watch family members die of easily preventable disasters.
Corporation propagandists spend millions to make the common folks believe that accountants have their best interests at heart. Boeing? The trains? Sometimes, I wish that being able to vote came with an IQ test that the person wishing to vote must score a minimum upon completion. At the very least, check to see how many conspiracy theories they subscribe to.
Usually technological innovation makes things safer, and then governments make it mandatory after the fact as a way of earning brownie points for "doing something" that was already being done anyways
@jdhenge No, governments usually pass good safety legislation when unions & labour movements demand it, giving them no choice. Also when liability issues for businesses incentivize it, but those regulations usually aren't as good.
@@jdhenge Technological innovation makes things safer, but also costs money and takes time to implement. Without the legislation due to the pressure of unions etc, noth8ing was 'being done anyways', as companies don''t want to spend a penny unless forced to.
Why is legislation needed? If you claim all the corporations care about is money, how is a) losing mining time to this whole fiasco b) being sued for millions of dollars, good for them? Remember, everything in life has tradeoffs, and you quite literally know nothing about what it takes to operate a mine.
I’ve visited the site many times on family holidays to Cornwall as a kid and never knew about this. Although it’s a tragic accident it’s nice to learn something new about a place I’ve been to often!
I've been to both the Levant Mine and the Wheal Roots ('Poldark') mine and one of them does have information boards about this disaster - including a little video animation showing how a man engine worked. I assumed it was at this one but it may possibly have been at the Poldark mine. I do tend to be someone who reads EVERYTHING (much to my family's annoyance) when I go round museums though, so you may just have missed it.
Just remember, when people say “full recovery”… it’s never actually a full recovery. That just means you lived through it. You might have lasting consequences like not walking right, not full use of all of your body, extreme and chronic pain, etc…
It's crazy to think that companies wouldn't be held liable as long as it was an accident. So many families loosing not only a loced one, but also the economic stability they brought. And the company acting like their life was worthless
I was so surprised to see somewhere so close on a video here! So used to far away places. My dad and his brother would go down into the mines near thier house and explore them, they think it was insanely stupid now. Tin mining was rough back then, I heard a story about a miner who died shortly after starting his job there. They made you buy/rent your gear, and pay it off with you initial work. He died so soon after he started that he didn't pay off his gear which was all lost in the collapse, so they made his teenage son work it off instead.
I cant believe that people actually worked like that. It really puts into perspective what "hard work" really means. And this is NOT the disaster I was expecting to happen to these people. I for sure thought the ocean was going to pour in or something lol
And what drives them to do it? Is it a virtue to work yourself to death for a pittance and the sake of powerful people? To push society in a never ending spiral of industrial greed? The problem is we turned this sort of behavior into a virtue, and all that has happened is their exploitation.
"The good old days!" - where every day is about survival and being disposable to the owners and stockholders. Good lord, sure, it builds character, but why are some people so obsessed with getting rid of safety regulations and osha and the EPA?!
There's a working man engine in the Kongsberg Silver Mine in Norway, and the tour guides have a short demo how it works. Most of the mine is flooded, though, so it doesn't go more than a few floors down before it hits water.
@@inc2000glw As the upper class lose their ethics and continue to keep more and more of the pie for themselves, many people find themselves having to choose between doing evil or having evil done to them. In a world of globalized big business, being a do-gooder often means being poor. For many people, gone are the days when one could make a decent living while being honest. Such was the case in the days of Jesus. He and the Apostles spent a lot of their time comforting those who suffered at the hands of the rich or went hungry because they refused to do evil. This scripture chain shows the message clearly: "Verily I say unto you, That a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." "If ye love me, keep my commandments." "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."
@@inc2000glw I mostly post it to help remind other people that this life isn't everything. All societies reach a point in which Good is punished or goes unrewarded while Evil is rewarded or goes unpunished. Yet, the core laws of God don't change. Those who spend this life doing and becoming evil will be compensated, and those who spend this life doing and becoming good will be compensated. It's tempting to throw up our arms in exasperation and stop resisting the pressures of the rat race. Yet, God expects more of us, and thru Him, we're capable of doing and becoming good without getting worn down. You don't need to have been rich to not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; you just need to have the mentality typical of those who are rich.
@@xitheris1758 I agree with everything you said, but I'll add the two verses that follow since yours usually gets posted by others in "eat the rich" contexts by people who are equally materialistic but just worse at it. The disciples ask "Who then can be saved?" to which Jesus replies "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." Understanding our dependence on God transcends the material provision He gives us to steward (and it's always a gift we neither earned nor deserved much like salvation itself).
@@scistorm17 Dawg what do you mean "eat the rich people contexts by people who are equally materialistic but worse at it"?? Have you actually ever talked to anyone that follows that ideology? Like actually talked, not just had a discussion looking for a gotcha. Because I have, and they're usually people living paycheck to paycheck disillusioned that working ends up being all there is to life if you want to even afford to live.
The contrast between the company who wouldn't replace or upgrade the system to prevent the disaster and the men who imediately went back to try to save others is insane.
I've been told that Richard Trevithick is my great, great, great grandfather or something like that. He was a mining engineer in Cornwall and worked on the first steam powered locomotives for transporting ore. Thanks for the eye opening video! For those interested the series Poldark is a great watch, and an insight into Cornwall and mining back in the day.
Years ago I designed a dwarf for a game who had a candle on his head so he could see. I had no idea miners actually did that but it made sense at the time. This was fascinating to watch.
I visited a Cornish mining museum when I was younger and we had the opportunity to go down to a mine that went out under the sea but I was too scared so my family left me on the surface museum. There was a 3D scale model of the mine shafts and it's incredible how far they reach in each direction. Terrifying!
It’s not too often these videos give me chills, but this one did… can you imagine surviving WWI only to die in such a tragedy. Regulations are written in blood and those who refuse to learn history are doomed to repeat it. I can’t believe how many politicians and billionaires think we need LESS regulations. Ugh
not necessarily....a lot of new regulation these days is done for political purposes and actually serves no actual purpose....look at all the "green energy" regulations....some of them are written just because of corruption and greed....like everything else, the truth is usually somewhere in the middle@@eadweard.
There is a difference between worker's rights regulations and the regulations most people talk about. You realize a lot of regulations are lobbied for BY THE BILLIONAIRES to decrease competition for their own businesses and further build their wealth? Most regulations are not for the people.
@@mrroams5812 Not to mention that billionaires (not all, but a lot) obviously want less worker rights to gain and save more money, some politicians follow that as well - and even tho, as dumb as it sounds, and no one in their right of mind should want that, too many people want to vote that. There are way people that'd love monarchies and dictatorships back because for some reason they think that the world would be better if someone could just take away all your rights and send the military to shoot you down if you'd say anything against that - fully believing somehow that a change back would never backfire for them personally, like all of them could be of importance while a machine would need to be kept running.
Woo! You've finally covered Cornwall! My home county! There's 3 fields between my house and a 600ft vertical cliff, the coast paths are great, there's some great stories you could cover from around here! lots of ships going down over the centuries, families getting stuck in caves when the tide comes in. A couple years ago twice I had to climb up and down "high cliff" 735ft Cornwall's highest vertical drop (it's not, I've considered dropping in on my MTB) as my cousin dislocated his shoulder at the bottom, I called coastguard and said they'd need a helo, they sent a CG team to the top of the cliff and a RNLI rib to meet me on the rocks, they still had to helo lift him out in the end as the rocks and sea were too treacherous for the rib to get close and stable enough, it was actually a very calm day, and no way for the CG rope teams to get down easily, It was quite difficult to convince everyone I was okay to carry on but they were all cool in the end, I could of had a winch up in the helo too but would of had to leave all my gear with the RNLI for later collection miiiles away, my cousin was all good in the end has several bolts in his shoulder now
mind you it was common practice that people rented houses from their bosses and had to buy food at the companies store. not only did they not compensate anyone, they drove them out of their homes when they couldn't afford rent and let them starve when they couldn't afford food.
I wish everyone that railed AGAINST unions today knew this history. This sort of "disaster" was not at all uncommon. It was simply considered a "cost of doing business".
Considering some of the history OF unions, including outright murder of workers who valued feeding their children tomorrow over 'collective bargaining', as well as heavy Mafia involvement, the real lesson is 'everything can be corrupt, don't assume anything is perfect'.
@@paganofthenorth448 yea...you can trust the Corporations so much more because they have proven how trustworthy they are in the past. That is why the "moral majority" gave them all the rights humans have in the USA by their stacked court (yea, that liberal court; because, and this is a quote from the GOP candidate for president at the time): "Corporations are people too".
@@GrumblingGrognard All around us is power being channelled against us, the common man operates under pretenses of law and order only to find hearth and home engulfed in chaos. I despise corporations, unions, and our governmental bureaucracy all equally. The law is a tiered system for the wealthy to rob and murder us without consequence. The union is a launderer of money and influence for political gain. The government is a gaggle of megalomaniacal midwits attempting play a game of Civ 5. The tree of liberty is parched in this desert. When will we water it?
imagine surviving the horrors of the great war, the miserable life in the trenches, bullets wizzing over your head and artillery shells raining down your hole only to die in a mining accident caused by negligence of a company in your country who you put your life on the line to protect.
Which is a tragedy and a blessing at the same time. A tragedy because it happened in the first place, and a blessing because you've finally found your peace.
Funny because troops from neither side were really protecting anything in ww1. They were just disposable pawns used for the interest of their empires and as soon as the war was over they were dumped back where they got them. The only war of aggression was that of Austro-Hungary and Serbia. Everything else was just the powers taking advantage of the situation to take down their rivals.
When old people talk about "back when men were men", they're talking about guys like these. Working in such a huge mine with candles and minimal equipment is quite a feat.
I 'm curious to see how modern day coal mines are talked about in the future. I was lucky enough to work at one that was considerably safer than the ones surrounding it, yet I wonder how much our lack off proper PPE and other safety equipment will effect the long term health of myself and my previous coworkers. I still remember seeing one of my coworkers getting his fingers 'de-gloved' when his hand got caught in-between two pieces of heavy equipment -and managements first instinct was to ask him not to go to the hospital and take a couple days of unpaid leave so it did not affect our 'safety record.' Thank god for OSHA and MSHA.
As far as I understand the main long term health problem for miners is lung damage from microscopic fragments breathed in and irritating the lung lining, causing scarring. What used to be known in the old days as 'black lung'.
No one should work at these mines, until they offer better conditions and benefits. It's the only jobs in town you say? Then move. Move to a city. Go to college. Get a different job. There are many different jobs other than mining available.
I degloved my thumb once. Not recommended 0 out of 5 experience. Had I not reacted to the crushing pain and pulled, it would not have been that bad had I waited for the engine to be lifted off.
My dad works in a nylon plant, he got degloved and lost a finger and they tried to do the same thing. I think it was still Monsanto then, though it's owned by a subsidiary now.
I've been here!! It's a national trust site and you can have guided tours of the surface buildings and a tiny bit of the mine! Guided tours are free for people related to those lost in the accident. You even get to see the machinery working and moving, it's super loud but really cool, the horse buckets are what threw me the most I think. The guide I had had himself worked in the mine industry and had some pretty gnarly stories about his work with explosives in Africa. Would absolutely reccommend visiting. We also got to hold some chunks of the ore and they were super heavy.
One of the worst mining disasters in Britain occurred in 1862 at the New Hartley coalmine in Northumberland, when the beam of the pumping engine snapped and fell down the mine's single shaft, completely blocking it. 204 mineworkers (some as young as 10) were trapped underground and died before rescuers could reach them. This video reminded me of it because in many mines (though not New Hartley) the pumping rod also carried the man-engine platforms.
How did they get horses and mules down into the mine? Were any of them hurt or killed in the "accident"? Such a tragedy for so many who had barely anything.
I hadn't heard of this disaster. You might look at the Sengenydd Mine disaster in Wales just before WW1 - an excellent example of companies saving money because they didn't care about safety. In the UK casualties on the railways were, proportionally, something like the 'daily wastage' in the trenches. Excellent video.
Tin from Cornwall has been valuable for thousands of years. Long before the Romans were even around tin from Cornwall was of great value. During the Bronze Age I think the next nearest source of tin to make bronze was Afghanistan. There were other copper mines, but few tin mines.
I come from Cape Breton ns. Home to one of the world’s largest sub sea coal seams. We have been mining beneath the ocean since the 1700s to supply the fort at louisbourg. We had hundreds of mines on this little island. We had 12 mines reaching deep and far under the Atlantic Ocean in my community alone. The last one closed its doors in 2023 with much protest to reopen.
The explosion at the number 12 colliery killed 65 men. A bump killed 22 men at the princess mine below the sea, an explosion killed a dozen men in a sub sea mine in 1979 at the 26 colliery here, the phalen mine partially collapsed and filled in with sea water which leaked into the adjacent 1b mine. And then there was the massive disaster at westray where an explosion shook the entire town and killed every single person left in the shaft. If you want some horror stories about down below look up our little island, or listen to the “men of the deeps”. They are a local men’s choir composed entirely of former coal miners who sing about their woes of labor working 800 feet deep a mile out under the ocean listening to the singing of the canaries in cages. They kept birds down in the mines because the birds would start to pass out from the toxic gasses coming out of the rock before the people would. They all knew that if they heard the birds go quiet to grab the cages and make their way up because they would all either suffocate or set off a massive methane explosion if they didn’t. Most of our mines didn’t have a “shaft” to go down, but a “slope” a long tilted corridor going deep down into the rock. We had a bunch of mining cars linked together and at the end of shift the men would hop in the cars and get winched up the slope instead of coal or rock. Well one day at the end of shift while the men were being winched up, the winch cable snapped. The mine cars flew down the slope and derailed. The winch cable was what ended up killing most men as it chaotically whipped from floor to ceiling and side to side mashing everything and everyone in its path. Some people survived with limbs torn off. Some people were unfortunately shorn in half. You can learn about mining, mining history, the advancements in mining and technology, as well as how mining disasters have shaped our modern day safety standards and labor boards at the glace bay miners museum
I've worked in mining - no matter what mine site I've worked when it comes to the way safety guidelines and procedures are laid out always boils down to the same saying; "safety standards are written in blood".
I am so glad I found this channel- I LOVE the way you do your videos. Keep it up! And I think everyone would agree with me that we all get excited when we see a new video from scary interesting!
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Hearing that the men who had finally made it out of the nightmare were willing to immediately jump back into the fray to try to rescue their friends is one of the most heartening things I’ve ever heard.
The true horror is having that life.
Generation after generation.
Hearing that the insurance company paid up despite not required to do so is just as heartening. I can’t imagine something like that happening today.
America!!!
People back then were real people. Nowadays, no way. Maybe a few people. Of course you'd never get anyone to do that job these days in the first place.
It's what makes life worth living
Hearing that several miners had survived WW1 only to be embroiled in this reminds me of a story of one of my great-great uncles. He'd been conscripted from the slate quarries in North wales to fight in the war. However, due to his literacy level he was made a company / battalion clerk - one day his company commander, a young Lieutenant, was making conversation and asked my uncle what he was going to do when the war was over. "I'll probably go back to the quarries sir." he replied. "Ah, the offices?" said the officer. "No sir, the quarry face." The officer then turned to my Great, great uncle and told him, that he was a bright chap and that if my great great uncle wanted, he could get in touch with his family and arrange a job for him in the family business's offices. At the end of the war, both men survived unscathed, my great great uncle returned to the quarry face. However, about a week later a letter arrived from his former company commander. He apologised for taking so long to get in touch but it had been tricky to find him and that the job offer was still open if he wanted it. My Uncle did take up the position and rose through the ranks. Looking at the list of deaths & injuries in the quarry, it looks like that officer probably saved his life.
wow your great great uncle dodged a bullet twice
@@potatofly2967One literally, the other metaphorically!
That is a super interesting story! I noticed as I got older (into my 30s and 40s) my heritage and where I came from became a more interesting topic to pursue. I don't know how old you are, but it is never too late to start. It would be really interesting to find out who this officer was because you might not be here typing had he not looked up your greatie greats.
It is wild to think about and fully comprehend all the wild stuff that had to have taken place for you to be here, but your greatie great definitely sounds like a man who lived a very full life.
PS: Ahhh your greatie great uncles ... So perhaps you'd still be here regardless. Still interesting though!
Beautiful!@@potatofly2967
Remember the U.S.S. Sultana ✝
The story of literally every mine disaster:
"Things were incredibly shitty, dangerous, and falling apart from neglect. The mine workers complained to management for years, but since replacing it cost money the mine owners decided it was instead better to _not_ repair anything and instead buy themselves a sixth wing for their mansion as well as the Pacific Railroad to complete their set. Then, suddenly, the thing everyone had been warning them about for years happened and a whole bunch of people died. After an investigation by the government, the mine owners were fined $12, which they declined to pay. No changes were made and the mine continued to operate in the same fashion for the next 50 years."
Unregulated Capitalism in 50 words or less...
Sadly Real
@@ReverseChadthis. The same logic can be aplied tô every dangerous job, given the proportions of danger.
@ReverseChad imagine thinking the conditions would be better working for a communist government
"LiTerAlLy" 😂😂😂
Fun fact: If the concept of a manlift interests you from an enginerring standpoint, there us a fully functional one called Fahrkunsten that is demonstrated to tourists in the Silver mines in Kongsberg, Norway. This one originally went down over 900 feet, and was in partial operation until the 1930's.
If you visit these mines, you can take a mining train in to some 1000 feet under ground, to visit machinery, Fahrkunsten, shafts and holes, fairly large mountain halls used for mine workers living under ground for weeks at a time, and have a glimpse down the largest of the shafts, that is as deep as 3000 feet from surface to bottom.
The Silver mines themselves sprawl across a whole mountain with a multitude of large and deep day openings. There's also a mining museum that is well worth the visit.
I'm not certain if its the only remaining manlift, but I'm sure its one of few in the world. It really is a sight as the guides step onto a small platform not much larger than a chair seat, holding on to a steel handlebar, then see the whole massive linked wood beam lift into the air, then step over to a meeting platform on the twin manlift and so forth. Nothing below them but a few hundred feet of shaft.
Gives you a certain respect for those who worked the mines.
The Kongsberg Silver mines operated for over 300 years.
Sounds like Moria
I've been there and it was really cool.
You can see "Fahrkunst" in Germany as well: Museum Grube Samson, St. Andreasberg, Harz Mountains and Bergbaumuseum „Lautenthals Glück“, Langelsheim , for example
Wow. That's amazing. I often wonder how many men actually died in the mines because of exhaustion or if someone had a quarrel with you.
@@silviamtz8961 More often than you'd think. In my podunk, I remember a guy coming out the wrong end of a wood mill "hog" (in ear-sized pieces). Rumor later had it he & his son-in-law, who worked it with him, had argued the day. Remember that old quote, "What evil lurks in the hearts of men?". We can _never_ know.
It's striking how much effort was put into saving workers after the disaster, yet simply maintaining equipment was out of the question.
1820 logic
@tyler7711 oh trust me, many places in America still operate that way. In management's eyes, it's only a problem once enough people die, and even then they only really care once it affects their bottom/people raise a fuss about it. Over a 100 years later and the people up top still see the working class as nothing more than wage slaves and peasants.
The workers were the ones putting all the effort in- the management were the ones neglecting a much needed upgrade to a new system, with replacements just being to fix stuff after it broke. One cared, the other couldn't "afford" to care.
@@tyler7711 now we half-ass both the maintenance and the inevitable rescue efforts! (I don't disagree with modern protocols that offer more protection to first responders on principle, but combined with the rampant negligence for most workers' safety it does say something about whose lives get valued)
@@Findecommie Aww come on now, how can a mine make money by spending it??
I'm an old oil and gas guy, and yeah, I get the mentality of these companies. The whole 'we care about your safety!' is BS. What they really mean is, 'don't fall into that vat, you'll ruin the batch and it will cost us millions in lost product and court fees.'
This is exactly how modern corporations would treat everyone if they could still get away with it. They are ruthless, reckless, and utterly without morals. Bravo on the insurance company for being uncharacteristically decent and paying out.
yes.
and there are actually people in these comments saying "kids these days" type bs. lmao
@@doggodoggo3000 Hear hear!
@@apocratos0174The conversation is far more nuanced than that, but companies that have a fiscal responsibility to return profit to shareholders, are structurally designed to behave in a way that is parasitic, deleterious to employees, and bad for society at large.
As for socialism, when you're spending other people's money - taken under force of law, accountability is low, bureaucracy, waste and corruption are high. But they are polar extremes, not the only choices.
But I'm sure that you already considered all that?
Halon's Razor
@@locklear308 No, it's not about stupidity - it's about absolute amorality. Green is king.
My great grandfather worked in the Red Jacket mine in Calumet Michigan in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s . He testified before the Michigan Supreme Court and helped change laws to allow better conditions for miners and all working people after he watched his friend be crushed to death. I read the transcripts. My great grandparents were also there at the Italian Hall Disaster in 1913. They were Serbian but there were many other ethnicities there because it was going on during the strike and many people were killed. Horrific things happened back then and they are going to happen again. Learn your family history so you never forget where you came from and who you are.
Hey fellow Michigander!
My great grandfather was a lazy asshole. MISS YOU GRAMPS, MISS YOU EVERY DAY!
Why does it matter?
So lemme see if I got this right: Anywhere your family is, something disastrous happens?
Your grandpa was a snitch.
In the Upper Peninsula of Michigan there were two sister mines separated by a basin. they were connected by a tunnel. Blasting occurred regularly, and one day in the Barnes-Hecker mine, a blast poked the basin open, causing insane pressure change followed by instantaneous flooding. The mine was 600 feet deep, and like the mine in this video, the only way up was by a ladder. Two men scrambled as fast as they could up the ladder as rushing water licked at their feet. The sounds of screams and crashing below them.
Wilfred Willis, a 23 year-old man was able to scale all 600 feet in 15 minutes. The man underneath him on the ladder was not so lucky. Willis would be the only survivor of the accident and had to be revived using smelling salts when he collapsed on the surface. 52 men died in that mine. The sister mine adjacent to Barnes-Hecker received knee-deep water through the tunnel that connected the two. Bodies could be seen washing into the mine through that tunnel.
It is now sealed and fenced off, serving as an underground tomb to the lives lost. There are also heartbreaking stories of some those who died. Men on their last day, others on their first. The surviving families still don't like to talk about it to this day.
When did this happen?
@@nickkohlmann I highlighted "Barnes-Hecker mine," right clicked, and selected "Search google."
November 3rd, 1926.
This kind of shi* is altogether too common in human history, and many of the very people who would pay these prices for profit seem to be eager to return to those days.
@@nickkohlmann Google search says Nov. 3, 1926. I search term I used is "barnes-hecker mine disaster", you can find articles about it with that.
R. I. P. To all the lives lost in that disaster and condolences to their families 🕊️
Some of them knew immediately they were done for even though they hadn't actually taken their last breath yet. Terrible only one soul survived. The guilt. The terrible terrible guilt.
I definitely expected this video to be about the mines being flooded with ocean water after those first few minutes.
I did kinda roll my eyes every time that was brought up, because, they're working under the ocean. It's nicknamed 'the mine under the sea'. Obviously everyone's first priority and the first danger they think of is going to be the ocean. There would be plenty of precautions taken against that, and way less against other, less obvious dangers.
Ikr
The ocean is a heavy thing, and rocks are strong things, the ocean is not heavier than rocks, they dug deep enough so that the ceiling wouldn't collapse, water couldn't get in there, at least not that much.. There was probably high humidity there, since they burned candles without fear of an explosion, lol..
Should be a requirement that management be forced to endure the same conditions so they understand just how unsafe it is
I live in Cornwall, it was a huge part of our heritage, I have nothing but admiration for these miners. Gevor Mine has a brilliant exhibition with genuine tools, machinery, and tunnels to explore, well worth a visit
I don't. Anyone from slave times, is racists.
And a perfect display for the current wokies talking about 'white privilege'; most western countries were built on the blood, sweat and tears of backbreaking work like this, and our forefathers fought hard to improve those conditions.
@@diatonicdelirium1743 Oh Jesus fucking Christ...
@@laughingbeast4481 please say what you want to say im curious
@@laughingbeast4481 He isn't wrong lmao
as horrifying as these incidents are, the fact that so many people are willing to drop everything to put themselves in danger to try and save the lives of strangers brings a tear to my eye. restores little hope in humanity.
These days they would just film your death so they can make money off the video.
He _literally_ made a point of describing how they were *not* strangers and this was a small town where "everyone knew everyone"... 🤦
"restores little hope in humanity." Today's humanity? Are you fucking serious rofl!
@@EmpressOfExile206 No, he said hundreds came from nearby towns and other mines to help with the rescue. Are you dumb? The East Pool Mine is 25 miles away which back then would've taken an entire day just to travel
Thats how MEN are.
As I mining engineer I've worked the gold and platinum in South Africa and the coal in Northumberland. The Levant disaster, bad as it was, wasn't the worst by a long chalk. The New Hartley disaster took 204 men, some only 10 years old - and set mining law to insist on two points of egress from underground workings. The Levant miners benefited from this. Senghenydd coal mine in Wales took 439 men after methane ignition followed by coal dust explosion. Accidents in the mines are always nasty because you're remote, and its dark. Pulling dead bodies out of confined spaces is something I can't recommend, but men still do it.
Heroes, who suffered and died so that we could live the easy, safe lives we have today.
And they were labelled by the owners and right-wing politicians as trouble makers and commies. And even today, people like Elon Musk would do away with many of these regulations because it hinders productivity and profits...
I live a five minute walk from the burial ground of the Hartley pit disaster. It’s absolutely devastating and gut wrenching reading the names of those children who died in the disaster. My ancestors also worked in the coal pits, it’s important to remember them and their sacrifice
And the worst is not the fact they die, it's fact some survive it and now you need to find super fast way to get them out of entrapment...
god you are so freaking good at telling these stories, perfect pronunciation and enunciation. but most importantly you tell these stories of the past with so much respect, knowing full well that all those affected were fully human with dreams, families, and its just so refreshing to see someone cover these disasters as they really are: horrific.
It frankly amazes me when people talk about “the burden of regulation” and “too much oversight ”…if corporations could be trusted to do the right things, we wouldn’t have had to enact laws in the first place.
These videos will give people an idea of what it was like when businesses were able to do what they pleased.
It got labeled an "accident" to remove liability from the company--of course it did. What a joke. And people thought companies cared about them back then. They never did and they never will. It's really sad that worker protection laws primarily exist because of events like this. :/
Sounds a lot like in the US!
MSHA is written in blood.
@@nightlightabcd turns out people are people. Who knew?
It got labeled an accident by whom? Do you really believe any company can simply label all injuries as accidents? Are you nuts?
Of course they did not care. A good example are the candles. Back then candles were made of animal fat, and when times were tough, miners when starving, would start eating the candles. When the companies got wind of this, they started poisoning the candles to stop them eating them.
My uncle took me to an abandoned mine in BC once and we looked up a crack in the rock to see all the floor levels above - it’s truly mind bending how massive some mines can be
Was it on the island?
@@funonvancouverisland naw, was near Kaslo & we trekked a ways out to find it, I’ll ask him if he remembers ..
@@blushslice epic. Nanaimo is a city here that is built on top of old mines it's pretty wild
@@funonvancouverisland I lived in Cumberland for a while. That place is swiss cheese underground.
@@funonvancouverisland second deadliest mine explosion in Canada too unfortunately, No. 1 Esplanade mine explosion.
150 men lost their lives back when Nanaimo had like 3,000 people. There are almost no videos about it.
Being all the way in the bottom of that mine would have to be terrifying
Hell yeah! Can you imagine being there!
Definitely nightmare fuel!
I couldn't even imagine going down there 😢
You think these jobs still don’t exist? Our wonderful Godly western countries just moved these “jobs” to poorer countries and use them as slaves for our benefit. That is how capitalism actually operates. At the end of the day, it’s about maximizing profits, no matter the cost of life. That is why capitalist love de-regulating everything. Hurts us while making them billions. Very demonic.
No.
They used to teach us about the Cornish mines in school when I was a kid, we even had a school trip to Morwellham Quay which was pretty cool.
They told us a story about one of these mines where they had mined into a cavity about a mile out to sea, so large their most powerfull lamps couldn't see any surface inside.
Most of these mines have been left to nature now, but you can still see the ruins all along the southwest coastal paths.
This is why we unionize.
🎵Which side are you on, which side are you on 🎵
Nope….
cringe lmao. Unions were not even legal back then, at least not in the same context they are today, nor was there any legislation regarding it. You have probably not even worked in a union environment
@@BM-rm9zyActually unions were legalized in 1871 in England and were the driving force behind shorter working hours and improved safety standards (as well as improved pay) throughout the end of the 1800s and afterwards.
So your dues can go to socialist political parties to make your kids make up genders? Yeah no.
I live down the road from Levant Mine, in Cornwall. This county has an old and very ancient mining history, and the legacy from these mines are still to this day causing many issues to the public, and local flora and fauna. I work as an aerial survey engineer and have been in the past tasked with mapping and modelling surface expressions of the mining legacy, such as collapsed shafts and instability issues with former mine workings. It's really great to see this on youtube!!
Add: I have been very lucky to have accessed an old abandoned Cornish mine still in its original state prior to its abandonment. I tell you this, its cramped and very sketchy maneuvering around the mine. It's nothing like your modern mines.
As a mine explorer, I know what you are up against, with many mines closed before 1880's and never to grace a map. The Cornish Great Flat Lode has thousands of shafts trying to extract the minerals.
I was the possibly the last person to visit the underground in Levant. The working were linked in to Geevor mine underground, which closed in 1987 and as a member of a local mining group, we were given permission to enter the mine via ropes. The mine was flooding at at a rate of 6ft per day, so we have a window of a few month to get down to the 40 Backs before it was lost forever. I still vividly remember the haul train that was left in situ, with no way to recover it. The 40 Backs was a very scary place, where you could here the sea above, knowing there was hundreds of feet of water above. When we left the mine, I was last to climb the rope, making me potentially the last person down the mine. I visited the shaft a few years back and this flooded right up. This was the shaft in the sea cliff, not the engine shaft with the beam engine, which has now restored by the Nstional Trust.
Insanely jealous you got to visit the bits that are flooded now!
@@emmahealy4863 One of the best mines I have ever seen. Modern (1985) and old Victorian all the same place. Spent 8 hours down there
Wasn't the restoration of the engine featured in that guy Martin show? I may be confused with another one but I have always been fascinated by them
I’m assuming it was called 40backs because the backs were 40 feet from the ocean floor?
My dad and grandad were both employed at geevor mine. They were there when it sadly closed
These are the kinds of conditions that bosses would love us to work under if they thought they could get away with it.
Guess what, they can and they do.
And yet the media only see the unions as the bad guy!
...Unions help some. That's why we get propagandized against them.
Yep, I've been in the union my whole career , 33 years so far. The only negative basically about unions is that eventually they get a little out of control and too demanding, losing sight of the core reasons that unions were created in the first place...
Every safety rule is written in blood.
I cannot imagine how awful it must have been to work in these conditions. It defies belief that people had to work like this in order to just make a simple living.
Miners were well paid
@@LawrenceTimme AHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH, oh wait you were serious. Lemme laugh ever harder. HAHAWHDAWIAWAHAHWAHAHAHAHADHSAHHAAHAHASHSDAHADHADHA
Donkin Mine in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia is currently the only operating sub-sea coal mine in the world.
The area is no stranger to sub- sea mines (or disasters!) having had many over the 250+ years of coal extraction.
The longest was nearly 8 km from shore!
Thanks for this episode. Very informative.
An entire branch of my family tree is from Cornwall, and knowing that tin mining was the dominant industry, it's horrifying to think about how many of my ancestors endured these conditions.
Do you want reparations?
@@theshed3641dudes sounding like they sent his ass to the mines 😂
@@manz7860 it’s todays victim climate. Not his fault I suppose
@@theshed3641 You're the only one talking about reparations. YOU'RE the one being the problem smh
@@hushpuppi3What
Having to work a job like this, out of desperation that otherwise you would not be able to feed yourself and your family, is truly one of the greatest injustices of humankind. The tragic disaster is just the cherry on top of a far greater tragedy: the fact that they felt they needed to be there in the first place, because that is how society is/was ordered.
Yeah we should have been communist instead. Now that’s a system that works!
Cornishman here.
Good content, and thanks for bringing this to the worlds attention again.
I think a little more mention of the solidarity of the Cornish Miners and their caring and social attitude would have offset the description of the work conditions, but its true it was very hard work.
Kernow bys vyken, glory to the Cornish hard rock Miners, past and future ;)
It wasn't solidarity in the socialist sense though. It was of a local area of brothers sense. Willing to help their fellow men.
Kinda funny how a lit candle on top of your head was a legit way to provide light back then.
I like how you gave so many specific examples sharing the names of individuals and telling their stories. Great video
There’s a saying: Regulations are written in blood. It means regulations are usually only implemented after something terrible (e.g., an accident) has happened. It seems to be human nature to only deal with something afterwards, not before.
The little history lesson before the talk about the disaster was as interesting, if not more than the actual disaster. I really enjoyed learning about the conditions people worked in back then. This was a great video, very well put together.
Right? And what great photos people took back then!
I live in Cornwall and I have been to Levant and this story I have heard so many times, she's 1 the 4 main mines, the others, Geevor, Botallack and Crofty. Keep up your amazing work 😁
I also live in Cornwall and me and my old housemate went last year to visit it, my old housemate worked as a miner in Crofty as a driller and he told me that there was a disaster at levant but I didn't know it was this, which costed so many lives 😢
My family has a history of miners. And just hearing how bad and hard the conditions are is crazy 😢
I feel bad for the victims, but morbid curiosity has me running back to these videos every time. 😭
For me, it's a weird sort of comfort watching videos like these.
Look up Schadenfreude... it's basically a universal feeling of relief or a thrill one gets from seeing someone else encounter misfortune.
All of us subscriber's are guilty, we are curious humans, it's in all of our DNA, I don't apologize for being a human being, The Judge above all Judges made us this way, the brain, common earthly sense, the gift of knowing right from wrong, that's how we evolve and learn to get to Sit With That Judge Above All Judges...it's that simple, just like the books it comes from!!!🙏🐲🌅🥰
Humans are naturally scared of death cause no one can tell us how it ends just how it begins and unfortunately, it’s like this! Even with walking next to Jesus it can be scary! We are taking the word of a book that is over 2000 years old. Written by poor people that were also scared of death…
@@zuttoaragi8349 That feeling, there are words in German and some Slavic languages..."schadenfreude" and "zluradost".
I’m glad that you addressed the mental wounds of the survivors as well. Those can also ruin lives.
Tragedy happens to all at some point or another in life, it's how you respond to it that makes a difference. This life is but a breath, eternity is forever.
@@jackjeffery1536 Everyone has mental limits. Some extraordinary circumstances push people beyond them, and they snap or break down. Literature that has survived for thousands of years accounts for modern things like PTSD, for instance Assyrian soldiers diagnosed with "the ghosts of your enemies haunting you" or the biblical story of Elijah who suffered from depression and suicidal ideation.
@@punbug4721 God is able to heal all who turn to Him.
@@jackjeffery1536 The Bible also records Paul telling Timothy to "take a little wine for thy stomach's sake," which tells us that God approves of human-made medicines and cures. The Psalms often make reference to healing balms, usually comparing them to Scripture, which would imply that both are good things. Now, if the stomach is one organ of the body, and the brain is also an organ of the body, reason follows that using medicine for the brain would be not only permitted but _encouraged_ by Scripture. Furthermore, regarding mental health, I specifically mentioned Elijah above because in that passage God tells Elijah to 1) "rise up," and 2) "eat and drink," which are two things that people diagnosed with chronic depression tend not to do, and this sedentary behavior tends to become a cycle which worsens the depression. All of the above can be described simply as knowing that "your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost," and being a good steward of that temple.
I'm from the UK, and have never heard of this incident. The one I think most people here remember is the Aberfan disaster, which was above ground, but the direct result of coal mining.
Yeah, I think, most think of Aberfan, coz A. its more recent, and B. most of the victims were children.
This type of safety negligence on behalf of the owner/management/exploiter is truly infuriating.
So, I know we just lost our elevator into the shaft, but you're still coming in to work tomorrow right?
If you don't come to work, we will dock your pay for the week
Ive been following this channel for 3 years now and you're by far my favorite storyteller. You don't add too much fluff and convey scary parts of the stories you tell in a matter of fact way that makes it both easy to understand and getting the direness across in these stories. Keep up the good work.
Crazy that the disaster happened almost 100 years after the mine originally opened in 1820! Generations of miners performing probably the most dangerous work on the planet yet their safety was so neglected. Thank you for bringing this story to light.
It was a lit fuse with a long, long rope. When it reached the top, everything came falling down.
The MOST unbelievable thing about this is the insurance company paying out.
I work in the mining industry and we always say that rules and regulations are written in blood. Its dark but true. We can work safely today because we learn from events like this, tragic as they are. Wild to see how far things have come.
Same here. What type of mine? I have worked for 2 years in an underground iron mine in northern Sweden. It is like a small city there about 1,6 km under the mountain.
@@lio.p Similar actually! Iron ore in australia! Im on conveyor maintenance so i jump between a bunch of different sites though.
If you have never been down a mine - or cave - you have no real idea of something like this. It is not just dark - you can see NOTHING. No light AT ALL. Yes, if there is any accident or worse, miners will stop to help out and rescue where they can. They know it may be their turn next.
Perpetual darkness. I have been there. Only complete blindness is a close comparison.
Underground dark? Never!!!
“Gly”: As an abandoned mine explorer that documents abandoned mines for TH-cams “Abandoned and Forgotten Places”, I can attest to the difficulty of climbing ladders up and down vertical shafts. It is an exhausting and grueling task and I can’t imagine climbing 600 - 1000 feet of ladders before and after your work shift prior to the invention of elevators. These men were tough as nails and deserve all the respect history can give them.
And miners had to go on strike to get paid for their time getting to and from the face. Here in Kent, we had mines up to 1,000m deep, with workings that went out under the sea for a mile or more, and the men weren't paid for all the time it took then to get to and from the face.
I recall going to the national coal mining museum on a school trip in yorkshire. Even as a kid I was blown away with just how long the lift took to reach the bottom. Even the torch & lamps they gave us were heavy af. My grandad worked in the mines & had some horror stories despite the saftey imrpovements,
That one guy in every minecraft server
Changes made by the British government in the 1980's have lead to an almost 100% safety record here, no miners have been killed or injured for a very long time. What were the changes? They just closed all the mines down, can't get hurt if there isn't any mines.
Yeah, here in the southern parts of the US, we just switched to open face mining.
Instead of digging mines, they just cut the entire top of a mountain off and then dig a big open pit.
They're beautiful 😒😡😫
There are still a few mines open.
Exactly!!! Lol
Me in Minecraft when my underwater mine suffers a gravel collapse
True tragedy
And some people romanticize the working conditions of this age....
And people wonder why there are unions and industrial regulation...
Leaving aside the horror of this story, those photos were fascinating. If any of the miners saw them it would have been the first time they'd ever seen their true working conditions, or what the mine actually looked like. I visited a disused quarry in Wales many years ago, and as part of the underground tour, they turned out the lights, so that the only illumination came from a few 'candles' dotted around the huge chamber we were in. The effect was truly shocking, suddenly you could only see the few metres illuminated by each candle, you had no idea of the size or geography of the chamber. The fact that men dug the slate out of that quarry by hand and explosives, with few, if any, of the protections we take for granted now, and in, practically, pitch dark, is beyond astonishing. Next time someone mockingly says "bloody health and safety!" to you, remember this.
I am glad you emphasize the importance of legislation for the safety of things. It scares me how people genuinely want to remove it instead of addressing flaws because they weren't around before legislation to live with the risk and watch family members die of easily preventable disasters.
Corporation propagandists spend millions to make the common folks believe that accountants have their best interests at heart. Boeing? The trains? Sometimes, I wish that being able to vote came with an IQ test that the person wishing to vote must score a minimum upon completion. At the very least, check to see how many conspiracy theories they subscribe to.
Usually technological innovation makes things safer, and then governments make it mandatory after the fact as a way of earning brownie points for "doing something" that was already being done anyways
@jdhenge No, governments usually pass good safety legislation when unions & labour movements demand it, giving them no choice.
Also when liability issues for businesses incentivize it, but those regulations usually aren't as good.
@@jdhenge Technological innovation makes things safer, but also costs money and takes time to implement. Without the legislation due to the pressure of unions etc, noth8ing was 'being done anyways', as companies don''t want to spend a penny unless forced to.
Why is legislation needed? If you claim all the corporations care about is money, how is a) losing mining time to this whole fiasco b) being sued for millions of dollars, good for them? Remember, everything in life has tradeoffs, and you quite literally know nothing about what it takes to operate a mine.
I’ve visited the site many times on family holidays to Cornwall as a kid and never knew about this. Although it’s a tragic accident it’s nice to learn something new about a place I’ve been to often!
I've been to both the Levant Mine and the Wheal Roots ('Poldark') mine and one of them does have information boards about this disaster - including a little video animation showing how a man engine worked. I assumed it was at this one but it may possibly have been at the Poldark mine. I do tend to be someone who reads EVERYTHING (much to my family's annoyance) when I go round museums though, so you may just have missed it.
Just remember, when people say “full recovery”… it’s never actually a full recovery. That just means you lived through it. You might have lasting consequences like not walking right, not full use of all of your body, extreme and chronic pain, etc…
Miners should of "personally" held the managers accountable.
This is the best channel I've stumbled across in YEARS. Been steadily binging the content. All wonderfully done, with the emphasis on interesting!
Its criminal that management got away with this as they were clearly to blame.
As long as capitalism hides their owners behind faceless companies, they'll always manage to evade justice.
It's crazy to think that companies wouldn't be held liable as long as it was an accident. So many families loosing not only a loced one, but also the economic stability they brought. And the company acting like their life was worthless
Wealthy Capitalist never get held accountable. It is better today but we still have a two tiered justice system everyone.
It's basically the corner stone of capitalism, nothing to worry about.
@@ChairmanTrump yes, because no socialist mines have ever had issues.
And the owners of the mine were probably most upset about the lost productivity and the need to hire 31 new miners.
I was so surprised to see somewhere so close on a video here! So used to far away places. My dad and his brother would go down into the mines near thier house and explore them, they think it was insanely stupid now.
Tin mining was rough back then, I heard a story about a miner who died shortly after starting his job there. They made you buy/rent your gear, and pay it off with you initial work. He died so soon after he started that he didn't pay off his gear which was all lost in the collapse, so they made his teenage son work it off instead.
I cant believe that people actually worked like that. It really puts into perspective what "hard work" really means. And this is NOT the disaster I was expecting to happen to these people. I for sure thought the ocean was going to pour in or something lol
I would like to see the politicians of today give it a try !!!!!!!!!!
And what drives them to do it? Is it a virtue to work yourself to death for a pittance and the sake of powerful people? To push society in a never ending spiral of industrial greed? The problem is we turned this sort of behavior into a virtue, and all that has happened is their exploitation.
"The good old days!" - where every day is about survival and being disposable to the owners and stockholders. Good lord, sure, it builds character, but why are some people so obsessed with getting rid of safety regulations and osha and the EPA?!
“Because these lazy new generations have it too good, despite the fact that I also lived under the protection of these regulations”
There is a middleground and we have passed it. @@yamihikarilightdark9
Pure horror!
Yet another example of corporations being too stingy to make badly needed repairs, preferring "saving money" over human lives.
They always will
There's a working man engine in the Kongsberg Silver Mine in Norway, and the tour guides have a short demo how it works. Most of the mine is flooded, though, so it doesn't go more than a few floors down before it hits water.
basically workers had no insurance. the hiring manager was like "let's just keep using it while it lasts"
"It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven."
I hear this passage more and more (mostly online)
@@inc2000glw As the upper class lose their ethics and continue to keep more and more of the pie for themselves, many people find themselves having to choose between doing evil or having evil done to them. In a world of globalized big business, being a do-gooder often means being poor. For many people, gone are the days when one could make a decent living while being honest. Such was the case in the days of Jesus. He and the Apostles spent a lot of their time comforting those who suffered at the hands of the rich or went hungry because they refused to do evil. This scripture chain shows the message clearly:
"Verily I say unto you, That a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God."
"For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"
"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."
"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him."
"If ye love me, keep my commandments."
"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."
@@inc2000glw I mostly post it to help remind other people that this life isn't everything. All societies reach a point in which Good is punished or goes unrewarded while Evil is rewarded or goes unpunished. Yet, the core laws of God don't change. Those who spend this life doing and becoming evil will be compensated, and those who spend this life doing and becoming good will be compensated. It's tempting to throw up our arms in exasperation and stop resisting the pressures of the rat race. Yet, God expects more of us, and thru Him, we're capable of doing and becoming good without getting worn down. You don't need to have been rich to not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; you just need to have the mentality typical of those who are rich.
@@xitheris1758 I agree with everything you said, but I'll add the two verses that follow since yours usually gets posted by others in "eat the rich" contexts by people who are equally materialistic but just worse at it. The disciples ask "Who then can be saved?" to which Jesus replies "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." Understanding our dependence on God transcends the material provision He gives us to steward (and it's always a gift we neither earned nor deserved much like salvation itself).
@@scistorm17 Dawg what do you mean "eat the rich people contexts by people who are equally materialistic but worse at it"?? Have you actually ever talked to anyone that follows that ideology? Like actually talked, not just had a discussion looking for a gotcha. Because I have, and they're usually people living paycheck to paycheck disillusioned that working ends up being all there is to life if you want to even afford to live.
I absolutely love your presentations. You're respectful of those involved and obviously take great care during your research process.
I cannot believe that this mine was under the ocean yet the disaster that occurred here was a completely dry affair.
The contrast between the company who wouldn't replace or upgrade the system to prevent the disaster and the men who imediately went back to try to save others is insane.
I've been told that Richard Trevithick is my great, great, great grandfather or something like that. He was a mining engineer in Cornwall and worked on the first steam powered locomotives for transporting ore. Thanks for the eye opening video! For those interested the series Poldark is a great watch, and an insight into Cornwall and mining back in the day.
Years ago I designed a dwarf for a game who had a candle on his head so he could see. I had no idea miners actually did that but it made sense at the time. This was fascinating to watch.
I guess helmets were too expensive for mine owners
Such amazing photos taken in a hellish landscape. Thanks Sean, for a piece of history that shouldn't be forgotten. 👍
So good its almost sus
Imagine being a company so greedy and shameful and worse than insurance company
Wow. I’m never complaining about my office job again.
I visited a Cornish mining museum when I was younger and we had the opportunity to go down to a mine that went out under the sea but I was too scared so my family left me on the surface museum. There was a 3D scale model of the mine shafts and it's incredible how far they reach in each direction. Terrifying!
It’s not too often these videos give me chills, but this one did… can you imagine surviving WWI only to die in such a tragedy. Regulations are written in blood and those who refuse to learn history are doomed to repeat it. I can’t believe how many politicians and billionaires think we need LESS regulations. Ugh
All regulation is good regulation.
We need to put billionare in mines and take all their money
not necessarily....a lot of new regulation these days is done for political purposes and actually serves no actual purpose....look at all the "green energy" regulations....some of them are written just because of corruption and greed....like everything else, the truth is usually somewhere in the middle@@eadweard.
There is a difference between worker's rights regulations and the regulations most people talk about. You realize a lot of regulations are lobbied for BY THE BILLIONAIRES to decrease competition for their own businesses and further build their wealth? Most regulations are not for the people.
@@mrroams5812 Not to mention that billionaires (not all, but a lot) obviously want less worker rights to gain and save more money, some politicians follow that as well - and even tho, as dumb as it sounds, and no one in their right of mind should want that, too many people want to vote that. There are way people that'd love monarchies and dictatorships back because for some reason they think that the world would be better if someone could just take away all your rights and send the military to shoot you down if you'd say anything against that - fully believing somehow that a change back would never backfire for them personally, like all of them could be of importance while a machine would need to be kept running.
Woo! You've finally covered Cornwall! My home county! There's 3 fields between my house and a 600ft vertical cliff, the coast paths are great, there's some great stories you could cover from around here! lots of ships going down over the centuries, families getting stuck in caves when the tide comes in.
A couple years ago twice I had to climb up and down "high cliff" 735ft Cornwall's highest vertical drop (it's not, I've considered dropping in on my MTB) as my cousin dislocated his shoulder at the bottom, I called coastguard and said they'd need a helo, they sent a CG team to the top of the cliff and a RNLI rib to meet me on the rocks, they still had to helo lift him out in the end as the rocks and sea were too treacherous for the rib to get close and stable enough, it was actually a very calm day, and no way for the CG rope teams to get down easily, It was quite difficult to convince everyone I was okay to carry on but they were all cool in the end, I could of had a winch up in the helo too but would of had to leave all my gear with the RNLI for later collection miiiles away, my cousin was all good in the end has several bolts in his shoulder now
What is RNLI? Glad you and your cousin made it out okay!
@@crakhaedlifeboats
@@chrisnorman1902 thanks!
"Bury Interesting" just say no to caves
Holey important comment
mind you it was common practice that people rented houses from their bosses and had to buy food at the companies store. not only did they not compensate anyone, they drove them out of their homes when they couldn't afford rent and let them starve when they couldn't afford food.
I also heard they had to pay for any tools they lost or broke, sad.
I wish everyone that railed AGAINST unions today knew this history. This sort of "disaster" was not at all uncommon. It was simply considered a "cost of doing business".
b b bb b but my $100 per paycheck!!!
Considering some of the history OF unions, including outright murder of workers who valued feeding their children tomorrow over 'collective bargaining', as well as heavy Mafia involvement, the real lesson is 'everything can be corrupt, don't assume anything is perfect'.
Now you get labor unions that lobby directly against your political interests and yolo your retirement pension on the stock market! So much better!
@@paganofthenorth448 yea...you can trust the Corporations so much more because they have proven how trustworthy they are in the past.
That is why the "moral majority" gave them all the rights humans have in the USA by their stacked court (yea, that liberal court; because, and this is a quote from the GOP candidate for president at the time): "Corporations are people too".
@@GrumblingGrognard All around us is power being channelled against us, the common man operates under pretenses of law and order only to find hearth and home engulfed in chaos. I despise corporations, unions, and our governmental bureaucracy all equally. The law is a tiered system for the wealthy to rob and murder us without consequence. The union is a launderer of money and influence for political gain. The government is a gaggle of megalomaniacal midwits attempting play a game of Civ 5. The tree of liberty is parched in this desert. When will we water it?
imagine surviving the horrors of the great war, the miserable life in the trenches, bullets wizzing over your head and artillery shells raining down your hole only to die in a mining accident caused by negligence of a company in your country who you put your life on the line to protect.
Which is a tragedy and a blessing at the same time.
A tragedy because it happened in the first place, and a blessing because you've finally found your peace.
Funny because troops from neither side were really protecting anything in ww1. They were just disposable pawns used for the interest of their empires and as soon as the war was over they were dumped back where they got them. The only war of aggression was that of Austro-Hungary and Serbia. Everything else was just the powers taking advantage of the situation to take down their rivals.
the elite have never cared about the working class and yet the working class keep drinking the Kool-Aid
More reasons unions are important
😂 the government wrote the laws and enforced them
@JooDawg the government only made workplace safety laws because unions lobbied for it, and used mass strikes to force the government to act.
?
Unions would have just negotiated more pay so they could collect more from the workers.
1:27 that kid looking like WTF am I doing here.
this is why we unionize
unions have no power in a capitalist democracy
Unions are on the rise again in America. 70% of Americans now support them up from just 20% just 30 years ago. Karl Marx was right.
When old people talk about "back when men were men", they're talking about guys like these.
Working in such a huge mine with candles and minimal equipment is quite a feat.
Can you imagine someone from Twitter or Google working in a mine!? They would try and sue you for terrorism and torture.
not a good thing though
@@hammerofscience534 Can you imagine someone silly enough to want to RETURN to these conditions?
I don't need to, they wear Red Hats.
Those people are idiots and they never did these these jobs anyways.
yeah i hope men will never have to be men again
What a surprise that management got away with it.
😢
Scooby doo hadn't been invented yet
I don't think anyone is gonna complain much about this type of job being completely automated, especially the mining part
I spent hours yesterday night watching all your mountaineering videos. This is my new favorite channel and I love these videos so much!
The under water cave diving did it for me...such a great channel!
@@conservativehippie9736I just HAD to tell you I LOVE your screen user name. Describes me and my favorite people to a T
You picked a good one. And Sean is the most awesome person on youtube. Very genuine.
@@LevelEarthWD ❤️🔥😊thank you so much!!!
@@conservativehippie9736that IS a great username lol I dig it
I 'm curious to see how modern day coal mines are talked about in the future. I was lucky enough to work at one that was considerably safer than the ones surrounding it, yet I wonder how much our lack off proper PPE and other safety equipment will effect the long term health of myself and my previous coworkers. I still remember seeing one of my coworkers getting his fingers 'de-gloved' when his hand got caught in-between two pieces of heavy equipment -and managements first instinct was to ask him not to go to the hospital and take a couple days of unpaid leave so it did not affect our 'safety record.' Thank god for OSHA and MSHA.
As far as I understand the main long term health problem for miners is lung damage from microscopic fragments breathed in and irritating the lung lining, causing scarring. What used to be known in the old days as 'black lung'.
No one should work at these mines, until they offer better conditions and benefits.
It's the only jobs in town you say? Then move. Move to a city. Go to college. Get a different job. There are many different jobs other than mining available.
I degloved my thumb once. Not recommended 0 out of 5 experience. Had I not reacted to the crushing pain and pulled, it would not have been that bad had I waited for the engine to be lifted off.
My dad works in a nylon plant, he got degloved and lost a finger and they tried to do the same thing. I think it was still Monsanto then, though it's owned by a subsidiary now.
I've been here!! It's a national trust site and you can have guided tours of the surface buildings and a tiny bit of the mine! Guided tours are free for people related to those lost in the accident. You even get to see the machinery working and moving, it's super loud but really cool, the horse buckets are what threw me the most I think. The guide I had had himself worked in the mine industry and had some pretty gnarly stories about his work with explosives in Africa. Would absolutely reccommend visiting. We also got to hold some chunks of the ore and they were super heavy.
Aw man the mine diagram out under the sea was SUCH a tease. But the story of the heroics and outpouring of support is heartwarming
One of the worst mining disasters in Britain occurred in 1862 at the New Hartley coalmine in Northumberland, when the beam of the pumping engine snapped and fell down the mine's single shaft, completely blocking it. 204 mineworkers (some as young as 10) were trapped underground and died before rescuers could reach them.
This video reminded me of it because in many mines (though not New Hartley) the pumping rod also carried the man-engine platforms.
R. I. P. To all of the lives lost in that disaster and condolences to their family and descendants today 🕊️
How did they get horses and mules down into the mine? Were any of them hurt or killed in the "accident"?
Such a tragedy for so many who had barely anything.
Elevators
We must not forget that greed was responible for the death of all those miners.
The miners were greedy. They didn't need to work down the mines. They wanted to because it was well paid.
I hadn't heard of this disaster. You might look at the Sengenydd Mine disaster in Wales just before WW1 - an excellent example of companies saving money because they didn't care about safety. In the UK casualties on the railways were, proportionally, something like the 'daily wastage' in the trenches. Excellent video.
Hi Sean, incredible story…..I shiver at the thought of being in a place like that…..these men and boys are beyond brave……..loving your channel! ❤❤
Tin from Cornwall has been valuable for thousands of years. Long before the Romans were even around tin from Cornwall was of great value. During the Bronze Age I think the next nearest source of tin to make bronze was Afghanistan. There were other copper mines, but few tin mines.
Cool history, it shows that long distance trade networks existed even back then.
I come from Cape Breton ns. Home to one of the world’s largest sub sea coal seams. We have been mining beneath the ocean since the 1700s to supply the fort at louisbourg. We had hundreds of mines on this little island. We had 12 mines reaching deep and far under the Atlantic Ocean in my community alone. The last one closed its doors in 2023 with much protest to reopen.
The explosion at the number 12 colliery killed 65 men. A bump killed 22 men at the princess mine below the sea, an explosion killed a dozen men in a sub sea mine in 1979 at the 26 colliery here, the phalen mine partially collapsed and filled in with sea water which leaked into the adjacent 1b mine. And then there was the massive disaster at westray where an explosion shook the entire town and killed every single person left in the shaft. If you want some horror stories about down below look up our little island, or listen to the “men of the deeps”. They are a local men’s choir composed entirely of former coal miners who sing about their woes of labor working 800 feet deep a mile out under the ocean listening to the singing of the canaries in cages. They kept birds down in the mines because the birds would start to pass out from the toxic gasses coming out of the rock before the people would. They all knew that if they heard the birds go quiet to grab the cages and make their way up because they would all either suffocate or set off a massive methane explosion if they didn’t. Most of our mines didn’t have a “shaft” to go down, but a “slope” a long tilted corridor going deep down into the rock. We had a bunch of mining cars linked together and at the end of shift the men would hop in the cars and get winched up the slope instead of coal or rock. Well one day at the end of shift while the men were being winched up, the winch cable snapped. The mine cars flew down the slope and derailed. The winch cable was what ended up killing most men as it chaotically whipped from floor to ceiling and side to side mashing everything and everyone in its path. Some people survived with limbs torn off. Some people were unfortunately shorn in half. You can learn about mining, mining history, the advancements in mining and technology, as well as how mining disasters have shaped our modern day safety standards and labor boards at the glace bay miners museum
I've worked in mining - no matter what mine site I've worked when it comes to the way safety guidelines and procedures are laid out always boils down to the same saying;
"safety standards are written in blood".
I am so glad I found this channel- I LOVE the way you do your videos. Keep it up! And I think everyone would agree with me that we all get excited when we see a new video from scary interesting!
Absolutely!! Always great. Love this channel!!