MineArchiveExplosion disasters
Firedamp, coal dust or blasting explosions underground.
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47 disasters in the 1850s, of 502.
| Disaster | Date | Type | Region | Fatalities |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gibfield Colliery explosion, 1850 On 11 February 1850 colliers at Fletcher's Gib Field Pit, Atherton, found gas in one of the bays and tried to sweep it out with their jackets. It fired at a candle that had been left burning, killing five and burning others. |
1850 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 5 |
| Usworth Colliery explosion, 1850 A large blower of gas burst from the Bensham seam in Wellington Pit, Usworth, on the morning of 5 June 1850 and ignited at a candle, killing twelve men and a boy. Nearly 160 people were underground, working by naked light, and the damage to the workings was slight. |
5 June 1850 | Explosion | Tyne and Wear | 13 |
| Bent Grange Colliery explosion, 1850 In October 1850 a fall of roof broke the gauze of a Davy lamp in the Riley Mine at Mr Butterworth's Bent Grange Colliery, Oldham, and the gas exploded, killing sixteen of about twenty-five colliers at work. The colliery had a single bratticed shaft. |
October 1850 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 16 |
| Haydock Colliery explosion, 1850 In November 1850 foul air fired in a pit of R. Evans and Company at Haydock, killing ten men and boys, most of them drawers, and burning others. The men often worked with naked candles against orders. |
November 1850 | Explosion | Lancashire | 10 |
| Houghton Colliery explosion, 1850 Clouds of coal dust thrown up the shaft at six in the morning of Monday 11 November 1850 were the first sign that Houghton Pit had exploded. Twenty-seven men and boys were killed, most of them by afterdamp. Wives and parents crowded the pit heap in their thousands while the search went on, and the bodies and survivors were not drawn up until three in the afternoon. The inquest at the White Lion Hotel ended in a verdict of negligence over the exposure of a naked light, though the jury could not say by whom. |
11 November 1850 | Explosion | Tyne and Wear | 27 |
| Morfa Colliery explosion An explosion of gas at Vivian and Son's Morfa pit near Taibach on 11 December 1850 injured around 30 men and eventually killed six, the earliest of the four disasters recorded at Morfa Colliery. |
11 December 1850 | Explosion | Neath Port Talbot | 6 |
| Middle Duffryn Colliery explosion, 1850 Between three and four in the afternoon of 12 December 1850 a fall of roof in No. 4 heading of Middle Duffryn Colliery released gas that fired at the candle of the fireman, Henry Jenkins, who was cutting a new wind-way to keep the air course open. The blast killed men underground and a sawyer at the pit top, and more died of their burns over the following week. The number of dead is given as eight or thirteen. |
12 December 1850 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 8 |
| Heys Colliery explosion, 1851 On 17 March 1851 an explosion of firedamp at John Kenworthy and Brothers' Heys Colliery, Ashton-under-Lyne, killed one man outright and injured eight, five of whom died. Six years later the same colliery lost forty men in a single explosion. |
17 March 1851 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 6 |
| Waunwyllt colliery explosion, 1851 Early on Monday 2 June 1851 a naked candle carried into an old working fired gas at Thomas's colliery, Waunwyllt, near Merthyr; three miners were fatally burned and a fourth injured. |
2 June 1851 | Explosion | Merthyr Tydfil | 3 |
| Ubberley Colliery explosion, 1851 Early on Monday morning seven men and boys walked into the south level of the Sampson pits at Ubberley behind the butty Ralph Hancock, who carried the only safety lamp; the rest had candles. Three hundred yards in, the firedamp fired and all seven died. Hancock had handed in his party's lamps the Friday before, satisfied the pit was clear. Six men on the north side, who had shut the doors behind them, survived. The coroner told the jury that no inspector had ever visited the district and called the new Act, with its four inspectors for the whole kingdom, ridiculous. |
18 August 1851 | Explosion | Staffordshire | 7 |
| Washington Colliery explosion, 1851 On 19 August 1851 gas fired at a light in Washington Colliery, County Durham, and the explosion killed 34 men and boys, two of them furnacemen who died trying to rescue others. Gas had been showing at the candles for weeks and some men had left their work in fear. |
19 August 1851 | Explosion | — | 34 |
| West Moor Colliery explosion, 1851 Shortly before one o'clock on 31 October 1851 an explosion in the metal coal drift of West Moor Colliery, Killingworth, killed six men outright and burnt eight more, two boys among them dying within hours. It came after a week of smaller explosions in the same working, and the coroner had come to the village that day for the inquest on an earlier victim. |
31 October 1851 | Explosion | Tyne and Wear | 8 |
| Warren Vale Colliery explosion, 1851 Warren Vale Colliery near Rawmarsh had been in production barely a year when it exploded on the morning of Saturday 20 December 1851. Fifty-one or fifty-two men and boys were killed, twenty-four of them aged sixteen or under, some of them fathers and sons working side by side. The blast threw two loaded corves up the shaft and wrecked the headgear, so that rescuers could not get down until half past nine. The coroner returned a verdict of accidental death and used his summing up to complain that the country had only four mines inspectors. |
20 December 1851 | Explosion | South Yorkshire | 52 |
| Ince Hall Deep Pit explosion, 1851 About six on the morning of Monday 22 December 1851, half an hour after more than a hundred men and boys had gone down A. F. Haliburton's Deep Pit at Ince Hall, near Hindley station, firedamp exploded in the south-west workings. Thirteen were killed, six of them boys of fifteen or younger. |
22 December 1851 | Explosion | — | 13 |
| Hebburn Colliery Explosion, 1852 A firedamp explosion at Hebburn Colliery on 6 May 1852 killed 22 men and boys after a single 37-yard bord became fouled with gas when a ventilation door was left neglected. |
6 May 1852 | Explosion | Tyne and Wear | 22 |
| Middle Duffryn Colliery Explosion, 1852 Ninety-two men and boys went down Middle Duffryn Colliery on the morning of Monday 10 May 1852. Shortly before nine o'clock a fall in the deep heading released gas which exploded; sixty-four died and twenty-eight came out alive. Fifty-five were killed in the explosion and its afterdamp, and nine more died escaping when the platform they had gathered on in the shaft gave way. It was the worst disaster in the Cynon valley to that date. |
10 May 1852 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 64 |
| Coppull Colliery explosion, 1852 A little before 7 a.m. on 20 May 1852 John Hargreaves' Coppull Colliery fired after men went into workings where a roof fall had cut off the air, killing 36. The pit had almost no ventilating power, and the colliers, who had to buy their own safety lamps, often worked with candles. |
20 May 1852 | Explosion | Lancashire | 36 |
| Seaton Colliery explosion, 1852 On 16 June 1852 firedamp exploded at naked lights in Seaton Colliery, near Seaham Harbour, the third explosion there that year and the first to kill. All six working at the place died, the youngest a boy of ten. |
16 June 1852 | Explosion | — | 6 |
| Bryndu Colliery explosion, 1852 One Thursday morning in November 1852 three men and a youth at Bryndu Colliery, Kenfig Hill, went into their workings with candles before the fireman had examined them with a safety lamp for firedamp gathered in the night. The gas exploded at once and killed all four, the youngest a boy of twelve. |
November 1852 | Explosion | Bridgend | 4 |
| Hemingfield Colliery Explosion, 1852 An underground explosion at Earl Fitzwilliam's Hemingfield Colliery, near Elsecar, at 1.30 pm on 22 December 1852 killed ten miners and injured twelve. The inquiry praised Benjamin Biram's fan ventilation, which had divided the workings into two districts and is thought to have kept the toll from being worse. |
22 December 1852 | Explosion | South Yorkshire | 10 |
| Black Vein Colliery explosion, 1853 In March 1853 firedamp exploded at the entrance to No. 13 in the Black Vein Pit at Risca, about half a mile from the pit bottom. Seven were killed at once, among them boys of twelve and thirteen, and three more men died later of their injuries, ten in all. The inquest blamed one of the injured men for using a naked candle, and a ventilation door left open. It was one of the explosions that made the colliery known as the death pit. |
March 1853 | Explosion | Caerphilly | 10 |
| Ince Hall Arley Pit explosion, 1853 In March 1853 gas exploded at the bottom of the upcast shaft of the Ince Hall Coal and Cannel Company's Arley Pit at Wigan, after the ventilating furnace had been damped down for repairs and relit. About fifty men and boys were killed. |
1853 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 50 |
| Bent Grange Colliery explosion, 1853 On 1 July 1853 firedamp exploded in the west level of Thomas Butterworth's Bent Grange Colliery, Oldham, killing twenty men and boys, thirteen suffocated and seven burnt. The inspector had already told the owner the ventilation was defective, and it was the pit's second disaster in three years. |
1 July 1853 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 20 |
| Bryndu Colliery explosion, 1853 Two days before Christmas 1853 John Williams, a collier of forty-one, went against orders into a part of Bryndu Colliery known to be gassy. His naked light fired the gas, and the explosion killed him, his eleven-year-old son Rees and three others. It was the colliery's second fatal explosion at a naked light in thirteen months. |
23 December 1853 | Explosion | Bridgend | 5 |
| Ince Hall Arley Pit explosion, 1854 At half-past two on Saturday 18 February 1854, eleven months after its first disaster, the Arley Pit of the Ince Hall Coal and Cannel Company at Wigan exploded again during a storm, killing 89. Thirty-seven of the dead were burnt; the rest were suffocated by afterdamp. |
1854 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 89 |
| Lundhill Colliery explosion, 1854 On 22 August 1854, as the Lundhill shaft near Barnsley was being sunk towards the Barnsley thick coal, firedamp that had often been seen issuing from a drainage borehole in the shaft bottom came out in force and exploded at the sinkers' candles, killing six. The owners had supplied a ventilating engine, air pipes and safety lamps, but the agent and contractor had not used them and were absent that morning. Two inquests cleared the owners. |
22 August 1854 | Explosion | South Yorkshire | 6 |
| Ffrwd Colliery Explosion, 1854 On 19 October 1854 an explosion of gas at the No. 9 Pit of Ffrwd Colliery, near Brymbo in Denbighshire, killed seven men and boys. It was fired by a naked candle flame igniting gas that escaped when an air-door was opened. |
19 October 1854 | Explosion | Wrexham | 7 |
| Ffrwd Colliery Gunpowder Explosion, 1855 On 21 August 1855 an explosion of gunpowder killed two people at Ffrwd Colliery, near Wrexham, one of them a boy. |
21 August 1855 | Explosion | Wrexham | 2 |
| Usworth Colliery explosion, 1855 On 24 August 1855 two experienced deputy overmen were killed by an explosion of gas at Usworth Colliery, in County Durham. |
24 August 1855 | Explosion | Tyne and Wear | 2 |
| Werfa Colliery explosion, 1856 In the spring of 1856 an explosion of gas at naked lights in Werfa Colliery, above Aberdare, killed a collier, Morgan Williams, and his ten-year-old son John, who worked with him. The sources place it on 17 March or 2 April. It was the colliery's third fatal explosion in seven years. |
March or April 1856 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 2 |
| Oakley pit explosion, 1856 On the forenoon of Monday 21 January 1856 firedamp exploded beneath a scaffold in a newly sunk pit at the Forth Iron Works, Oakley, near Dunfermline. The three colliers working on it to open an ironstone seam were killed, and the blast threw missiles out of the shaft that killed Marion Drysdale, a fifteen-year-old at the pit mouth. The Inspector blamed an unventilated space under a scaffold whose planks had not been made airtight. |
21 January 1856 | Explosion | Fife | 4 |
| Ynisdavid Colliery Explosion, 1856 An explosion of gas in the Big Vein at Ynisdavid Colliery, Cwmavon, on 24 May 1856 killed twelve colliers. Eight were burnt and mutilated and four died of the effects of gas and their injuries; they were found lying within a short distance of one another. The ground was known to be dangerous, safety lamps only were allowed, and two large Struvé ventilators were being erected but were not yet finished. |
24 May 1856 | Explosion | Neath Port Talbot | 12 |
| Ynisdavid Colliery Explosion, Cwmavon, 1856 A firedamp explosion in the Big Vein, deep in the workings, killed nine men and three boys; the colliery's own agent led the rescue and recovery, recorded in detailed inquest testimony. |
24 May 1856 | Explosion | Neath Port Talbot | 12 |
| Old Coal Pit Explosion, Coalbrookdale (1856) An explosion caused by neglected ventilation rules at the Old Coal Pit, Coalbrookdale, killed eleven men and boys, including two who died attempting a rescue. |
3 July 1856 | Explosion | Shropshire | 11 |
| Cymmer Colliery Explosion, 1856 On the morning of 15 July 1856, 160 men and boys went down the Old Pit at Cymmer Colliery near Porth for the six o'clock shift. A gas explosion near the mine entrance trapped those already deeper in; 114 died, most of them of afterdamp. Forty-nine were boys under sixteen, fifteen of them under twelve. The mine's manager and four officials were charged with manslaughter and all were acquitted. |
15 July 1856 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 114 |
| Lundhill Colliery explosion Firedamp exploded twenty minutes after the men had eaten their dinner underground, killing 189 of the 200 below. The pit then caught fire, and the only way to put it out was to divert a stream into the workings, which left the bodies where they lay for months. |
19 February 1857 | Explosion | South Yorkshire | 189 |
| Cwmtillery Colliery explosion, 1857 On the morning of 27 May 1857 firedamp exploded in the Three-Quarter seam of John Russell's Tyr Nicholas (Cwmtillery) Colliery, a pit with no furnace and one ventilating door. Thirteen died, among them the fireman Samuel Merrifield, whom the jury blamed for walking into gas with an open lamp. |
1857 | Explosion | Blaenau Gwent | 13 |
| Heys Colliery explosion, 1857 At 1.25 p.m. on 31 July 1857, at the end of the dinner hour, flames burst from the flues of the underground boilers at John Kenworthy and Brother's Heys Colliery, Ashton-under-Lyne, and an explosion followed that killed everyone on the brow, forty men and boys. |
31 July 1857 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 40 |
| Talwrn Colliery explosion, 1857 At nine on the morning of Friday 21 August 1857 firedamp exploded on the north side of the No. 2 pit at Talwrn Colliery, Coedpoeth, where twenty-four men were at work. The shock killed a horse in the connected No. 3 pit. Four men were found dead, suffocated some thirty yards from where they worked, and eight more were burnt. The inquest found accident, but H.M. Inspector Peter Higson told it the pit was foul with gas from bad ventilation. |
21 August 1857 | Explosion | Wrexham | 4 |
| Ripley Colliery explosion, 1857 A nine-foot heading driven 160 yards to the rise at Ripley Colliery was ventilated by a brick-and-lime brattice up its middle. The under-viewer had a hole broken through the brattice a hundred yards from the face and never saw that a door was fixed in it, so the hundred yards of heading beyond filled with gas. It exploded twice in October 1857 and killed six men, four of them on the 10th with George Gyte dying of the first explosion on the 5th. The inspector, John Hedley, prosecuted the under-viewer and the deputy and the magistrates convicted both. |
5 and 10 October 1857 | Explosion | Derbyshire | 6 |
| Bardsley Colliery explosion, 1858 On 2 February 1858 firedamp exploded through both working seams of the Victoria and Diamond pits at the Bardsley Colliery Company's colliery near Ashton-under-Lyne, killing 53. The inspector, Joseph Dickinson, had warned in writing of the exact faults that caused it, and there was no viewer. |
2 February 1858 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 53 |
| Lower Duffryn Colliery explosion, 1858 At about two in the morning of 25 February 1858 an explosion of firedamp in the upper colliery of Thomas Powell's Lower Duffryn, at Cwmpennar near Mountain Ash, killed nineteen men and boys. |
1858 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 19 |
| Aberaman Colliery explosion, 1858 An explosion of gas at Aberaman Colliery on 20 March 1858 fatally injured two colliers, who died two days later. |
20 March 1858 | Explosion | Rhondda Cynon Taf | 2 |
| Bryndu Colliery explosion, 1858 At about five in the afternoon on 27 or 28 May 1858 firedamp exploded in the West Nine Feet heading of Bryndu Colliery, Kenfig Hill, killing eleven or twelve men, the colliery's worst disaster and its third fatal explosion in six years. The coal there was so hard it had to be blasted, and the fireman, Jenkin Lewis, who was among the dead, is believed to have unlocked his safety lamp to light a fuse. |
May 1858 | Explosion | Bridgend | 12 |
| Morfa Colliery explosion, 1858 An explosion of gas at Morfa Colliery, Taibach, on 25 or 26 November 1858 killed four colliers. Afterwards one man's safety lamp was found with its top off and a homemade key to its lock in his pocket, and none of the lamps was locked, though all had been locked when the shift began. Opening a lamp saved the walk to the lamp room to relight it. |
26 November 1858 | Explosion | Neath Port Talbot | 4 |
| Yew Tree Colliery Explosion, 1858 A firedamp explosion in Yew Tree Colliery's Crombuke mine, caused by a skipped safety inspection, killed 25 men and boys -- the worst mining disaster in Tyldesley's history. |
11 December 1858 | Explosion | Lancashire | 25 |
| Agecroft Colliery shot-firing accident, 1859 On 6 September 1859 two colliers were fatally burned at Agecroft Colliery, near Pendlebury in Lancashire, by a heavily charged shot that blew out its stemming. |
6 September 1859 | Explosion | Greater Manchester | 2 |