In September 1950 one of the worst mining accidents in the history of British coal mining occurred in the Ayrshire village of New Cumnock. It is one of my first memories. For several tense days the world’s media descended on the small Ayrshire mining village as rescuers strove to reach the men trapped deep underground.
British Pathe News described this as ‘a truly remarkable story of how ordinary men worked tirelessly in a race against time and the forces of nature to achieve one of the most dramatic and remarkable rescues ever attempted.’.
The events are depicted in the 1952 film The Brave Don’t Cry.
| James Keir Hardie | |
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The colliery was developed by New Cumnock Collieries Ltd. The shaft was sunk in 1942 on the site of an older pit that had been abandoned almost 60 years earlier. The project brought new prosperity to what had been considered a dying area by the local mining community, attracting many miners from Lanarkshire to the village with the promise of employment. A policy of advanced mechanisation was employed by the owners and the ‘Castle’ was one of the best equipped and most productive collieries in the Ayrshire coalfield. At the time of the disaster coal production was in the region of 4.5–5000 tons per week, extracted mainly from two seams known locally as the ‘Main Coal’ and the ‘Turf Coal’. Before the accident Knockshinnoch employed approximately 700 men.
By 1950 Knockshinnoch Castle was operated by the recently formed National Coal Board (NCB), Scottish Division, who had taken control from the New Cumnock Collieries Ltd following nationalisation of the coal industry by Clement Attlee’s Labour Government in 1947. The NCB continued to invest in the development of modern mechanised techniques at the pit. The colliery also boasted great welfare for employees including a new canteen and pithead baths, which were opened amidst a blaze of publicity during the first week of September 1950.
The accident occurred on Thursday, 7 September 1950 at approximately 7.30 pm. It was during the afternoon shift when a large volume of liquid peat or moss broke through from the surface into the No. 5 Heading section of the main coal seam in the South Boig district of the mine.
The inrush occurred at the point where the No. 5 Heading was being driven towards the surface at a gradient of 1 in 2, breaching the outcrop of the seam directly beneath superficial deposits and a glaciated lake filled with liquid peat or moss. The liquid matter burst into the pit, rushing down the steeply inclined heading, filling miles of underground workings and sealing off all escape routes to the surface.
There were 129 men working underground at the time – six working close to the pit bottom managed to escape, reaching the surface by way of the shaft before the inrush sealed their exit. 116 men found themselves cut off from the pit bottom, finding refuge from the encroaching sludge deep within the extensive mine workings. A further 13 men who were working in the No. 5 Heading at the time of the inrush were unaccounted for.
It was a race against time, as the men remained trapped underground for two tense, traumatic days under constant threat from the encroaching liquid peat, rapidly deteriorating air quality and gas.
Fortunately a telephone link to the surface remained intact, allowing the men to provide those on the surface with details of their location. This delicate lifeline proved crucial. The men were eventually reached, being rescued by being led through the old disused gas-filled Bank No. 6 mine workings which ran close to Knockshinnoch, equipped with Siebe Gorman Salvus oxygen rebreathers (87 sets in all, mainly from fire stations).
The 13 men trapped close to No. 5 Heading could not be reached. Their bodies were recovered many months later. They had survived after the rescue operation had been discontinued. We will always remember them.