| 词条 | 1912 North Mount Lyell disaster | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 释义 |
The 1912 North Mount Lyell disaster (also known at the time as the Mount Lyell disaster and North Mount Lyell fire)[1] refers to a fire that broke out on 12 October 1912 at the Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company operations on the West Coast of Tasmania. The mine had been taken over from the North Mount Lyell Company in 1903.[2] StartThe fire started on a Saturday morning, between 11:15 and 11:30 am, when the pump house on the 700 ft level of the mine was reported as being on fire. Only 73 men made their way to safety on the first day. Initially the status of the fire, numbers, casualties and survivors were confused in the first day or so. Considerable problems occurred removing men from the mine who were still alive. Many became trapped as they were working in remote stopes and didn't know of the fire until it was far too late, as there was no emergency warning system operating in the mine. Instead, men had to run along the levels and drives calling to the men, warning them of the serious danger that faced them. 170 men entered the mine that day. 42 were never to be seen alive again.[3] "Letter From A Dead Man"During the rescue party's attempts to find any still alive in the stifling depths, they came across a group of men on the 700 ft level. One of these, Joe McCarthy, left a note pinned to a timber with a "spider" (a tool the miners used to hold their candles in). The note read:
"40 men in 40 stope"On Monday 14 October, 1,100 ft of rope was lowered down the main shaft of the mine. Attached to it was a signal gong. It was originally meant for the men working on fixing the skids in the shaft, however, late in the afternoon, watchers heard the rap of the line. It sent the message: "Pull to surface". When the rope was pulled up, a handkerchief wrapped around a tobacco tin was attached to it. Inside the tin was a penciled note: "40 men in 40 stope. Send food and candles at once. No time to lose. J. Ryan" Rescue attemptThe rescue attempt involved the transporting of breathing equipment from one of the Victorian mining towns to Queenstown, via a speedy shipping across the Bass Strait and the alleged fastest times by engines on the Emu Bay Railway, the Government Strahan–Zeehan Railway line between Zeehan and Regatta Point, and from there by the abt line to Queenstown.[4] Such was their rush to get the rescue gear to the mine, the {{SS|Loongana}}, the ship which crossed Bass Strait carrying the equipment, made the crossing in 13 hours, 35 minutes - a record which stood for many years. Also the train travelling times between Burnie and Queenstown were never bettered.[5] LegacyAs a result of the fire, initially 42 lives were lost; the bodies were buried in unmarked graves in the Queenstown General cemetery. Initially, the first two bodies to be recovered were buried in the Linda Cemetery, however when the final victim (John Bourke) was recovered, the pair were buried at Queenstown at the same time as Bourke. One of the miners, Albert Gadd, who escaped death and then re-entered the mine to assist in the rescue efforts, was hospitalised in Launceston and died on 20 February 1913 from carbon monoxide poisoning.[6] Gadd, whose wife was delivered of a son two months later, can be regarded as the 43rd victim of the mining tragedy. He was posthumously awarded the Clarke Gold Medal from the Royal Humane Society in Melbourne. Silver medals were awarded to 30 rescuers, among them engineer Russell Mervyn Murray, later the mine's general manager.[7] Royal CommissionThe royal commission that was held at the time of the retrieval of bodies after the fire, and despite various theories as to the cause of the fire, an open verdict remained.[8][9] Although Blainey covers the details of the disaster in The Peaks of Lyell, writing 40 years after the event, there were still variations upon the "official" versions of the event, amongst "old timers" in Queenstown. Some of these are aired and detailed in Bradshaw's verbatim record of the newspaper reports and the royal commission, as well as being incorporated into Crawford's recent novel. A number of themes arise from reading Blainey, and others on the subject: the rise of trade unionism on the west coast at the time, and the lack of preparedness for such disasters by the mining companies. Also one recurring theme in some of the stories was the rumour or suggestion of the presence of a woman disguised as a man working underground. At the Centenary of the event at the Queenstown Heritage and Arts Festival Peter Schulze's book An Engineer Speaks of Lyell [10] elaborates an argument that the most likely cause of the fire was an electrical fault[11] as a result of faulty installation of the pump motor at the 700 ft level. Schulze, who had access to more documents than Blainey and the twin advantages of an electrical engineering background and mining experience, concludes that the Royal Commission process was manipulated to give a result that best suited the Company, for whom an adverse finding could have been financially ruinous. It was especially at fault for naming the suspected arsonist, against whom there was no evidence apart from his prominence as a Union leader. He concedes that following the accident the Company followed best practice in mine management and labour relations.[12] CasualtiesThis list of victim details is compiled from the following sources:
CentenaryThe Queenstown Heritage and Arts Festival of 2012 celebrated the centenary of this event. Part of the celebrations included a collection of songs entitled Fire Underground performed by The West Coast Singers, an ensemble of vocalists organized and directed by Kerrie Maguire.[13][14][15][16][17] The West Coast Singers toured Tasmania with this concert in the following months, including performances at the Cygnet and Tamar Valley Folk Festivals in January 2013.[18] The tour wrapped up with a performance at the Paragon Theatre, Queenstown in June 2013, on the 100th anniversary of the last funeral of the disaster's victims. References1. ^Later references now conflate the North Mount Lyell and Mount Lyell locality names to the Queenstown disaster 2. ^The Peaks of Lyell Fourth Edition, end of chapter 17 The Fall of an Empire page 161 3. ^The Peaks of Lyell Fourth Edition, start of chapter 22 The Disaster page 214 4. ^Singleton, C.C. and Burke, David (1963) Railways of Australia, Angus and Robertson, Sydney - pp132-135 regarding the 15 October 1912 train trip - and Emu Bay and Mount Lyell railways contexts 5. ^The Peaks of Lyell Fourth Edition, middle of chapter 22 The Disaster page 222 6. ^{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article50694277 |title=A Lyell Hero |newspaper=The Examiner (Tasmania) |volume=LXXII, |issue=46 |location=Tasmania, Australia |date=22 February 1913 |accessdate=17 February 2019 |page=6 |via=National Library of Australia}} 7. ^{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article238974110 |title=For Bravery |newspaper=The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) |issue=10650 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=12 July 1913 |accessdate=15 February 2019 |page=15 |via=National Library of Australia}} This article gives names of all recipients. 8. ^Rimon, Wendy. "The Mount Lyell Fire", page 244 of The Companion to Tasmanian History. 9. ^{{Citation | author1=Tasmania. Royal Commission on the North Mount Lyell Mining Disaster | author2=Tasmania. Parliament | title=Royal Commission on the North Mount Lyell mining disaster : report of the Royal Commissioner | publication-date=1913 | publisher=Government Printer | url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/34447378 | accessdate=12 October 2012 }} 10. ^{{Citation | author1=Schulze, Peter Ross | title=An engineer speaks of Lyell : a quadrilogy | publication-date=2012 | publisher=P. R. Schulze | isbn=978-0-646-58279-5 }} 11. ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-06/cause-of-mt-lyell-disaster-questioned/4299184 Cause of Mt Lyell disaster questioned 12. ^{{Citation | author1=Schulze, Peter | title=The North Mount Lyell disaster - a miscarriage of justice | journal=Journal of Australasian Mining History | publication-date=September 2011 | volume=9 | pages=94–116 | issn=1448-4471 }} 13. ^http://www.queenstownheritageartsfestival.org/qhaf/#WestCoastChoir 14. ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-12/mine-disaster-rememberred/4309092?section=tas 15. ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-07-18/town-to-mark-mining-disaster-centenary/4139006 16. ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-06/cause-of-mt-lyell-disaster-questioned/4299184 17. ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-08/exhibition-marks-mining-disaster/4300922 18. ^{{cite web|url=http://www.tamarvalleyfolkfestival.com/2013Programme.html |title=program of the 2013 Tamar Valley Folk Festival, including The West Coast Singers}} Further reading
Primary sources(in some parts Bradshaw has direct transcription from the Zeehan and Dundas Herald for similar dates)
External links
9 : 1912 in Australia|Mining disasters in Australia|Western Tasmania|Disasters in Tasmania|Fires in Australia|1912 fires|Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company|West Coast Range (Tasmania)|20th century in Tasmania |
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