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By D. J. Griffiths

Beyond doubt it is practically impossible to eliminate all chances of accidents from falls. Mother Earth is not going to give up her treasures without some sacrificing on our part. This particular question ranks among the important subjects connected with coal-mining, and has been given less attention as a factor of life- and limb-destroyer than any other cause. The single fatalities which happen create very little attention; nevertheless, when counted up at the end of the year, they outnumber the unfortunate ones that are mowed down by the wholesale by mine explosions. Fire-damp and coal dust were often considered the greatest evils in coal-mining. All records, however, prove this conclusion to be wrong. The second annual report of the Bureau of Mines gives the loss of life caused by falls of coal and roof in 1910 as 1,310, and in 1911 as 1,321. The reports of Pennsylvania mine inspectors for a period of thirty-three years show that 59.38 per cent of all the accidents underground were caused by falls of roof and coal. Also, the Bureau of Mines shows in its last issue on fatalities that accidents from fall of roof and coal killed more men than any other two causes combined, and that they account for more than half of the deaths under- ground. It seems we are getting too accustomed, taking too many things for granted, running too many risks, trusting too much for the best, and preparing too little for the worst. We must remove the cause; then the effects will cease. However, I can see that a better day is here. The main damaging factors underground are falls of roof and sides. A bad roof is tender and lacks the adhesive qualities to sustain its own weight over comparatively small areas. A roof of any character which is frequently penetrated by well-defined slips and cleats, is characterized as a treacherous roof. The carelessness of men has been one of the main causes of most of the accidents in mining as well as in any other industries. Three Grades of Miners Miners can be classified into three distinct grades, to-wit: the experienced and careful, the experienced and reckless, and the inexperienced. The accidents which the first class usually meet with occur through the carelessness of their co-workers, as well as through accidents which are termed unforeseen, such as falling roof between timbers, and between the timbers and the face of the coal. This may have 'previously given evidence of being absolutely sound and safe, but be released by invisible slips or by sudden outburst of occluded gases in large quantities, as we term big blowers or feeders,

Jan 1, 1913

Jan 1, 1930

MR. STOUT: The picture shows the plan of the "V"-system as worked at Berwind mine, in a small strip of coal adjacent to the 4th right entry. The dotted line (indicating) show the position of the break rows as set for each of the three consecutive breaks. In two cases the break rows failed to function properly and as a result, the roof caved along the points of the "V's" as well as back along the faces a short distance. This affected the ventilation to a certain extent, but was remedied immediately by cutting through the points near the cave and setting additional timbers. At the present time we are putting in the break row of heavy red spruce props, making the row straight instead of curved as is shown in the picture; in this way we believe we can better control the breaks. The three "V" entries were driven up 14 feet wide, for a distance of 260 feet without cross-cuts. A very neat and substantial line brattice was carried up each entry as the places advanced. The principal factors in determining the success of this system are ventilation, roof control, and transportation. We are well pleased with the results from these three "V" places and now have four other places, about 500 feet to the west of these, driving at the present time in which we hope to get still better results. A MEMBER: What centers did you use there? MR. STOUT: We used 70 feet. This may be increased or decreased according to local conditions. MR. F. W. WHITESIDE (Chief Engineer, Victor-American Fuel Co.) Will you please describe roughly how your cars are handled? MR. STOUT: Cars are brought from the parting and pushed up along the faces by a storage battery locomotive. The faces are about 70 feet long and we found that five or six cars can be loaded and transported very conveniently. It is important to get a quick exchange of cars, and in this way we were able to keep the shovelers busy at all times. A MEMBER: What is the grade in your "V" entries? MR. STOUT: Five per cent in favor of the loaded trip. A MEMBER: What is the angle of your "V" faces? MR. STOUT: The angle at the throat is 45 degrees. MR. SAMUEL ANDREWS: In what direction does the air travel? MR. STOUT: The air travels down the dip entries and is deflected up the first "V" entry, and travels along the points, and returns down the last entry. There is no more difficulty in ventilating "V" faces than in ventilating rooms, providing the points are kept open. A MEMBER: What amount of air do you have in that section? MR. KAISER (Superintendent, Berwind Mine): Eighteen thousand cubic feet per minute. MR. ANDREWS: It is necessary, Mr. Stout, to brattice these places?

Jan 1, 1925

MR. HARRINGTON: I would like to ask Mr. Bottomley if they fire their shots while the men are in the mine? MR. BOTTOMLEY: No sir; the shot-firing law in our State requires the shots to be fired after the men are out of the mine. We fire more shots than we did under the hand method of loading. Where formerly four holes were drilled, now we drill eight, using the same amount of powder as we did formerly, perhaps a little more, but we use a slower grade of powder. CHAIRMAN LITTLEJOHN: Any further discussion, gentlemen? MR. GIBSON: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask Mr. Bottomley, if, in his shot-firing system, as I understand it, he has a very high coal and is working something like eleven feet? MR. BOTTOMLEY: Something like that. MR. GIBSON: I read the article that you referred to. Did you use both the first and the second delay explo¬ders in shooting the coal? MR. BOTTOMLEY: We use the ordinary fuse. MR. GIBSON: That is what I wanted to find out; whether you use the delay exploders and the detonators. In Utah, we are getting away from the fuse altogether, because we do not think it is accomplishing anything to use the electric light on the cap, and' at the same time shooting with fuse. We are defeating the object we might gain in using the electric safety lamp. That is a point that might be discussed a little further. MR. E. H. JOHNSON, The Coloder Company: I would like-since it is a general opinion that mechanical loading breaks up the coal, to ask Mr. Bottomley, if he finds a larger percentage of small coal, or how much, through the use of the mechanical loaders? MR. BOTTOMLEY: We do not find any great difference. In fact, we have succeeded in improving our lump coal percentage, and that is important, because it is largely domestic. At first, when the machines were installed, the boys shot the coal too hard, and we fell down a little, about two or three per cent, the first month, in our lump percentage, and we tightened up a little and changed our methods in shooting and got on to the stunt of drilling more holes and getting a slower grade of powder. We could not load as much coal in one day as we could before, but we did succeed in in. creasing our lump coal percentage four and a half per cent over the hand method, and that is quite a factor-quite an important factor and since our domestic trade is over with, we loosened up on the shooting and we are running about the same as we did with the hand loading, maybe a half per cent more, or one per cent, but pretty much the same. MR. SHUBART: Your coal is very high? MR. BOTTOMLEY: Yes. MR. SHUBART: Have you tried sunbbing the coal before shooting? MR. BOTTOMLEY: No, we have not tried that. It is very hard coal to shoot; we have no defined cleavage in our coal. It is the worst coal I ever saw to shoot. We do not try to snub it. Formerly, as I said, the miners drilled four holes, pretty well up near the top, and then four holes down, within about three feet of the bottom. It is the same thing as a snub shot, and that we find is the best method for shooting the coal. We have not tried any mechanical device for snubbing as yet. SECRETARY SHUBART: At one mine I saw snubbing tried with a Jeffrey undercutter with a seven-foot Jeffrey bar. This mine, by the way, is very similar to Mr. Bottomley's condition. They have very high coal, so the snub cut is a small percentage. They cut a seven foot undercut and raise the machine on an eight inch tie and undercut five feet to give the effect of a snub cut, 14 inches at the front of the cut, and then six inches at the back of the cut. They made a very marked increase in lump. (The bug dust would be a small percentage of the total coal), and they increased the percentage of the slack at the same time. They found a decrease by reason of the easier shooting of about 15 per cent in their slack. In other words their nut and lump coal ran considerably higher and their slack decreased 5 per cent with the snubbing cut. Mr. Bottomley, I believe, understands those conditions.

Jan 1, 1926

By Todd A. Myers

Forward Looking Statement Disclaimer This presentation may include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements about the Company's vision, strategy, operations, growth, development and any other statements containing the words, "believes, " "expects, " "anticipates, " "plans, " "estimates, " and similar expressions. There are a number of factors that could cause Westmoreland Coal Company's actual results to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements including, but not limited to: general economic and business conditions; healthcare cost trends; the Company's ability to manage growth and significantly expanded operations; the ability of the Company to implement its business strategy; the Company's ability to pay the preferred stock dividends that are accumulated but unpaid; the Company's ability to retain key senior management; the Company's access to financing; the Company's ability to maintain compliance with debt covenant requirements; the Company's ability to successfully identify new business opportunities; the Company's ability to achieve anticipated cost savings and profitability targets; the Company's ability to utilize its tax net operating losses; demand for electricity; the effect of regulatory and legal proceedings; and other factors identified in the Company's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and subsequent reports filed with the SEC. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of developments occurring after the date such statement was first made.

Jan 1, 2008

Jan 1, 1931

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Jan 1, 1991

Jan 1, 1947

By Steve Griles

Mr. Griles did not make his speech available for reprint. Looking Down the Road: The Environmental Side of the 1990s and Beyond Environmental Social Responsibility Love Canal, Buffalo Creek, Widow Combs, Bohpal and Three Mile Island are familiar names to all of us-names which evoke memories of environmental tragedies. These memories, as well as memories of other environmental disasters, lead us to pose this question: What is the nature of the environmental social contact between industry and society? The manner in which one answers this question will. in large measure, answer the question of where one thinks environmental issues will go, or should go, in the 1990s and beyond. The history of the evolution of the environmental movement will be helpful in defining and under- standing just what society's environmental responsibility is and, perhaps, what it will be. To Define the Future Start With the Past The common law, which most of the United States adopted from the English system of jurisprudence, traditionally considered pollution control and other environmental issues to be a matter of determining the relative rights of private property owners and of individuals. Legal and equitable theories, such as nuisance, negligence, trespass and the law of riparian rights, were utilized to allocate responsibilities between parties under the common law. The discharge of pollutants into streams and into the air was by and large considered acceptable, at least up to the point that another's "reasonable" use of the same air or waterway was significantly impeded. Further, the judicial decisions interpreting the applicability of the common law to the protection of the environment generally reflected the social and economic pressures of the age. During the Industrial Revolution, the decisions and policies had a marked tendency to favor industrial development. Jobs and industrial growth are deemed as important, and in some cases more important, than the protection of people and property. Additionally, the idea of a social responsibility, beyond that owed to a competing land or water user, was nearly alien to the early common law.' One could even go so far as to say that, had there been a social environmental contract under early common law (which, of course, there was not); but if there were, it would have been to promote actions which facilitated industrial development, even at the expense of the environment. Post-World War LI industrial expansion brought with it a growing awareness of limits on the environment's ability to absorb increasing levels of pollution. Thus evolved an era of social and political adjustment, as society began to shift away from supporting big business and industrial development and toward supporting domestic government programs and limits on industry. States gradually stepped in with efforts to address environmental issues. The Pennsylvania Clean Streams Law and the West Virginia Surface Mining Act of 1939, while lax in comparison to today's standards, nevertheless marked definitive efforts toward altering the balance between industrial development and environmental protection Pollution control continued to be viewed as a state responsibility through the 1950s, until Congress began, for the first time, to allocate funds for federal research on air and water pollution and to implement

Jan 1, 1988

?Go for the Coal? Simulator Training Outline ?Training Adult Learners ?Benefits of Simulator Training ?Simulator Training at Kennecott Energy -Training Priorities -Data Utilization ?Questions

Jan 1, 2004

By J. A. Smith

The topic assigned me by the Chairman of the Institute, "Safety Practices in Franklin and Williamson Counties, Illinois," I fear will necessarily resolve itself into a paper on shale dust, its application and the results obtained. I returned .only last week from a three weeks trip through these counties at which time, through the courtesy extended me by the operators, I had ample opportunity to visit and inspect many of the largest mines in the field, some of which are among the largest in the United States. With the exception of shale dust and ventilation, I see but vary few instances where the Illinois mines are further advanced in safety precautions than the western mines, and in some respects I believe the operators of the West are further advanced in safety methods than their eastern brothers. Great care is exercised in handling of all ventilation currents. This is an aboslute necessity, as this field is quite gaseous, and the peculiar geological structure of the overlying and underlying strata makes airtight seals very

Jan 1, 1924

The Fifty-ninth Regular Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute convening at the Hotel Colorado in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, was declared in session at 10:30 a.m., by Past President Charles M. "Dock" Schloss, Schloss and Shubart, Inc., Denver, Colorado. Dock introduced Mike Zakotnik, Jr., General Superintendent, The Kemmerer Coal Company, Frontier, Wyoming, President of the Institute. His introduction of President Zakotnik follows: Fellow Members, including our charming and beloved secretary, Gussie Whiteside, and our lovely Mrs. Cerise: It is now the appointed time to convene the Fifty-ninth Regular Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute which I now declare in session. At our last meeting we elected Mike Zakotnik, Jr., President, and lie has served the Institute intelligently and industriously since his election.

Jan 1, 1963

The 70th Regular Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute convened at the Steamboat Village Inn, Steamboat Springs, Colorado, and was in session at 10:00 a.m. The session was called to order by Past President O. F. Lewis. Consultant, Colowyo Coal Co., Denver, Colorado. Mr. Lewis introduced President A. F. Geiger, Manager, Navajo Mine, Utah International, Inc., Fruitland, New Mexico. Following are Mr. Lewis' remarks: Ladies and gentlemen, members of the institute, guests and friends, welcome to Steamboat Springs and the 70th meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute. From all appearances this is our largest meeting and should be the most successful. When I last spoke to you I was President of Colowyo Coal Company and the Rocky Mountain Coal Institute but that has changed. Colowyo Coal Company was acquired last Dec. by W. R. Grace & Co. and operates as Colowyo Coal Company, Division of W. R. Grace & Co. I am confident these people will make a worthwhile contribution to the coal Industry.

Jan 1, 1974

The thirty-first regular meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute was called to order at 11: 10 o'clock A. M., Wednesday, June 22nd, 1932, President T. H. Butler presiding. The Honorable Louis Marcus, Mayor of Salt Lake City, delivered the address of welcome. On motion of W. H. Bachman and seconded by D. J. Parker, it was voted that, inasmuch as the Minutes are printed in the annual bulletin, the reading of them be dispensed with. The President made his annual report. The Secretary-Treasurer made his annual report of the financial condition of the Institute. R. Dawson Hall addressed the meeting. The following committees were appointed by the President: Auditing-L. P. Pearce, Chairman; Joseph, Parmley, R. R. Knill. Nominating John Emrick, Chairman; D. J. Parker, John Marks. Resolutions-D. R. Wilson, Chairman; H. Petersen, Robert Williams, Jr. There being no further business to come before the meeting, the same was adjourned at 11: 55 o'clock A. M.

Jan 1, 1932

Mr. Pickett's remarks were primarily concerned with the legislative aspects of the coal industry. Mr. Pickett stated that as a result of the 1952 election, only two senators and eleven representatives are now in the legislature who have ever served under a republican administration. He said there are 425 legislative issues now on the floor of Congress concerning the coal industry, but the coal industry has difficulty in legislation, because, although there are 31 coal states, only 11 states produce more than 5,000,000 tons per year, and 11 states produce between 500,000 and 5,000,000 tons of coal a year. In these states there are 44 senators and 195 representatives, less than a majority in either house, if all could be counted on to support the coal industry. An important committee to the coal industry is tile House Ways and Means Committee, composed of 25 members, 15 Republicans and 10 Democrats. Even with the support of the senators and representatives from these 22 states, legislative action is difficult.

Jan 1, 1954

By Michael A. Berdine

Twentymile Coal Company?s first longwall face in the late 1980?s was oriented approximately 45 degrees to the major coal cleats and 45 degrees to the primary horizontal stresses. This combination of stress and coal cleating resulted in frequent violent bursts of coal along the longwall face. The bursts created particles of sufficient size and force with the potential of causing injury to employees and occasional damage to shield components. Partial web cutting was subsequently developed in an attempt to relieve the stress on the coal face and required the shearing machine to travel to the tailgate and back for a full 36 inch web. The partial web cutting pattern is focused on first cutting the lower 90% of the seam to relieve the stress as the shearer travels from the headgate to the tailgate. The web depth during the headgate to tailgate pass is typically in the range of 70% to 80% and varies with conditions to maximize production rates. The top and bottom of the seam in the remaining 20 to 30% of the web are then cut out to allow the shields and face conveyor to advance. 100% of the web is cut at each gate end for a distance of approximately 19 shields. This paper addresses some general mine geology and the procedures and benefits of partial web cutting with respect to safety, production and maintenance on a high production longwall face.

Jan 1, 2004

The 65th Regular Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute convened at the Stanley Hotel, Estes Park, Colorado, and was in session at 10:00 a.m. The first session was called to order by Past President Joe T. Taylor, Kaiser Steel Corporation, Palo Alto, California. Manager of the Stanley Hotel, who welcomed the guests to the Stanley. After a few remarks, he introduced Bob Dean, for- mer Manager of the Stanley Hotel and again associated with the Stanley, who also made a welcoming talk as Mr. Dean has hosted the Institute at the Colorado Hotel in Glenwood Springs and in Estes Park. Mr. Taylor introduced President Stanley C. Shubart, Secretary-Treasurer, Schloss & Shubart, Inc., Denver, Colorado. Stan was raised in the machinery end of the coal industry following the footsteps of his Dad who was one of the founders of the RMCMI in 1912. And following his Dad's years of service to the Institute, 12 of them as Secretary, Stan has been active as Chairman of the Hotel & Registration Committee for 16 years, and, prior to his election as President, was General Chair- man for two years He is a graduate of the University of Colorado with a degree in mechanical engineering. He served our country in World War II and retired as a Colonel, Army Ordnance, after 43 years in the Reserve. He is a Trustee of National Jewish Hospital and was their President for 3 years. He has been active in many Military and professional societies, and in civic projects. I give you our President, Stan Shubart, for his remarks.

Jan 1, 1969

MR. GERALD ALLEY (C 11 i e f Draftsman, C. F. & I. Co.) : This invention is primarily intended to correct anything that goes wrong with the fan and any conditions in your air current underground which do not produce a change in your fan water gauge

Jan 1, 1925

[CURTIS M. BELDEN RMCMI PRESIDENT 1999-2000 on behalf of the RMCMI Board of Directors and Officers of The Rocky Mountain Coal Mining Institute cordially invites you and your family to attend the 96th Regular Meeting and Convention to be held June 25 thru June 27,2000 Durango, Colorado]

Jan 1, 1999

Jan 1, 1990