Explosion disasters

Firedamp, coal dust or blasting explosions underground.

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16 disasters in the 1820s, of 502.

Disaster	Date	Type	Region	Fatalities
Backworth Colliery explosion, 1820 On 29 March 1820 two hewers were fatally burned by an explosion of gas fired at a candle at Backworth Colliery, in Northumberland.	29 March 1820	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	2
Cwmgwrach explosion, 1820 On 9 June 1820 an explosion in the coal workings at Cwmgwrach, in the Vale of Neath, killed five people. Two of them were girls, Elizabeth Pendry, aged six, and Annie Tonks, aged twelve. The names of the other three dead, the owner and the cause are not recorded.	9 June 1820	Explosion	Neath Port Talbot	5
William Pit explosion, 1821 On 13 April 1821 a sudden great outburst of firedamp in the Main Band workings of William Pit, Whitehaven, reached an open light and exploded, killing twelve: five haggers and seven boys and girls. Each hagger had been issued with a Davy safety lamp, but working with the top off was common. It was the first of the pit's great explosions; two years later a worse one killed thirty-two.	13 April 1821	Explosion	Cumbria	12
Felling Colliery explosion, 1821 On 23 October 1821 an explosion at Felling Colliery near Gateshead killed six. It was the third of the colliery's four nineteenth-century disasters, and by far the least recorded: only the date and the number of dead survive, with no names, cause or inquest.	23 October 1821	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	6
Wallsend Colliery A Pit explosion, 1821 On 23 October 1821 the A Pit of Wallsend ('Russell's') Colliery exploded while 56 men and boys were working the Bensham seam close round the shaft. The blast destroyed the brattice that divided the single shaft into upcast and downcast, cutting off the air; 52 died, most suffocated, and only four survived.	1821	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	52
William Pit Explosion, 1823 A firedamp explosion in William Pit's Main Band workings at Whitehaven killed 32 people, including 15 boys and 2 girls, and seventeen pit ponies — one of at least fourteen serious explosions recorded at the pit over its working life.	18 October 1823	Explosion	Cumbria	32
Rainton Plain Pit explosion, 1823 Early on the morning of 3 November 1823 an explosion in the Plain Pit of the Marquess of Londonderry's Rainton Colliery killed 55 men and boys, the second disaster at the pit in six years. Boys reaching the shaft just before had reported the Davy lamps standing on fire.	3 November 1823	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	55
Newbottle Colliery Dolly Pit explosion, 1824 On 19 November 1824 an explosion in the Dolly Pit at Newbottle Colliery killed eleven men, eight of them overmen and wastemen. The blast tore out the brattice dividing the shaft and dropped it to the bottom.	1824	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	11
Cwmllynfell Colliery explosion, 1825 In 1825 an explosion at the Cwmllynfell anthracite mines in the upper Swansea Valley, opened five years earlier by Reynolds and Aubrey, killed 59 men. A plaque at the national mining memorial garden in Senghenydd records it.	1825	Explosion	Neath Port Talbot	59
Fatfield Colliery explosion, 1825 On the evening of 3 July 1825 an explosion in W. M. Lamb and Co.'s Juliet or Judith Pit at Fatfield, known as Harraton Outside, killed all eleven men below and the horses. A few hours later forty or fifty pitmen and boys would have been in the mine.	3 July 1825	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	11
Jarrow Colliery explosion, 1826 On the morning of 17 January 1826 firedamp exploded in the Bensham seam of Thomas and Robert Brown's Jarrow Colliery, near South Shields, killing 34 men and boys of the 48 below. The seam had been reached only a short time before, and the pit had been inspected that morning and judged safe.	17 January 1826	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	34
Stargate Colliery explosion, 1826 A firedamp explosion at about 3 a.m. killed 38 men and boys, twenty men and eighteen boys, as they went down to the Brockwell seam at Stargate Pit; it left nineteen widows and sixty-two children without fathers.	30 May 1826	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	38
Jarrow Colliery explosion, 1828 At 3 a.m. on 15 March 1828 an explosion at Jarrow Colliery killed eight men, most of them shifters working the night shift. The coroner and jury found that no one was to blame, the pit having been considered in a good state and well ventilated.	15 March 1828	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	8
Croft Pit explosion, 1828 On the evening of Wednesday 6 August 1828 a sudden discharge of firedamp in the Earl of Lonsdale's Croft Pit at Whitehaven spread into distant workings and was fired by the miners there. Six men died; others were burnt.	6 August 1828	Explosion	Cumbria	6
Houghton Colliery explosion, 1828 Seven men and boys died in the New Pit at Houghton-le-Spring on Monday 1 September 1828 — the first disaster at Lord Durham's colliery, which had been sunk only five years before. The accident was put down to a door in the mine having been carelessly left open on the Saturday night, so that foul air gathered over the weekend and fired when the pitmen came back on Monday morning with their lights. The inquest returned accidental death.	1 September 1828	Explosion	Tyne and Wear	7
Washington Colliery I Pit explosion, 1828 At about 3 p.m. on 20 November 1828 an explosion in the I or Eye Pit of Washington Colliery killed all but one of the fifteen in the pit, eleven of them boys. The onsetter, Michael Hall, survived badly burnt. The pit had been examined that morning and judged perfectly ventilated.	20 November 1828	Explosion	—	14