The Thing In The Mine

by J. R. Ayers

  “I can run one of the scoops down to the charging station if you want,” Kevin said to Dixon. Dixon nodded and said,

  “Yeah, get one of em’ on charge anyway. There should be enough juice left in one of the other ones for us to get started.”

  Kevin made his way to a battery scoop and headed down one of the intersecting shafts to the nearest charging station, The other men stowed their dinner buckets near the elevator cage and waited for Dixon to pass out work assignments. He told one of the men, Chet Townsend, to get a Long-Airdox Continuous Mining Machine ready to tram up to the working face of the newly exposed coal. “We gotta drive a cross-cut right off of the feeder shaft,” Dixon said to Townsend. “Once you get cuttin’ good take it right into the gob.”

  “Shouldn’t we check for methane first?” Townsend asked.

  “I ran my meter,” Dixon said. “It’s a little high, but we’ve had forty-eight hours for it to clear out. We’ll be alright.”

  Townsend wasn’t happy with the Foreman’s reply. It was Dixon’s job to check for gas—he was the only man on the crew who had the proper equipment for detecting methane. “I don’t know Royce, you know this section’s new. Maybe you ought to double check.”

  “I said it was okay,” Dixon snapped. “Now come on, let’s get some friggin’ work done!”

  Townsend reluctantly walked over to a Continuous Mining Machine and Dixon turned his attention to another miner, Clarence Oberman. “Clarence, start up that shuttle car and get it in position.”

  “But, I’m the roof bolter. I ain’t too checked out on shuttle buggies,” Oberman said.

  “I ain’t gonna need you for roof boltin’ until we cut into that face a little deeper” Dixon said, “So go ahead and run that shuttle car for me, at least until Kevin gets back.”

  Oberman wasn’t happy, but he climbed in the shuttle car, even though he didn’t feel comfortable operating the piece of equipment, especially since it looked like it had been worked on recently. There were several fingerprints and smudges near the cable reel collector ring and it was obvious by the small pile of butt-splices and old electrical tape on the floor beneath the car that someone had been working in the area recently.

  Oberman was just about to power up the machine when he noticed a small cable protruding from the collector ring. He trained his cap light on the insulated wire bundle and looked at it for several seconds. He was sure that he could see two bare wires on the outside of the cable close to the frame of the shuttle car. Concerned, he called Royce Dixon over to the machine with a wave of his hand. Dixon didn’t even try to hide his irritation.

  “What is it now?”

  “There’s a skinned spot on this cable here,” Oberman said pointing at the collector ring. “Maybe we ought to tape it up before we turn on the power.” Dixon added his light to Oberman’s and leaned over for a closer look.

  “Yeah, I guess we should,” he said. “I’ll go find some electrical tape. Boy, I don’t like all this delay. We’ve got coal to mine.”

  Before he went to the connector tunnel for tools, Dixon assigned J.T. Braxton the job of moving the remaining battery scoops. He tasked Pete Shrewsberry and the second shuttle car operator, Rodney Felts, with inspecting the conveyor belt in the connector tunnel and got Ed Mackay busy shoveling a path for the battery scoops.

  Kevin’s uncle Ed was the oldest man on the crew and the most talkative. Some of the men often joked that Ed was older than the coal he was mining, at which point he would reply, “Yeah, I’m old but I can still out dig all you youngsters put together.” And he probably could. His primary job was to operate one of the Continuous Mining Machines but he could do just about any job that didn’t involve computers. Technology wasn’t Ed’s strong point. But, when it came to getting coal out of the ground, there were few in the business who could out work him.

  Dixon rummaged around in a toolbox until he found a roll of electrical tape and a pair of lineman’s pliers. The delay getting production started was beginning to give him a sour stomach on top of the headache he had woke up with that morning.

  Chet Townsend was lounging near the mining machine patiently waiting for Dixon to give him the word to tram the hulking machine up to the newly excavated coal face. He found himself almost nodding off—he hadn’t slept well in days and the new baby girl at home seemed to save the worst of her crying for those times when Townsend was having his most restful sleep. His wife had been a nag lately too. She didn’t like all the overtime Chet had been working the last week or so. She liked the extra money, though. And unbeknownst to her at the time, she was soon going to need it.

  Clarence Oberman watched Dixon make his way back to the shuttle car and wished he had called in sick that morning. He had absolutely no interest in operating a shuttle car all night long. He was a roof bolter and roof bolting was what he wanted to do. Most of the men hated the thought of operating the bolting machines, especially the drilling part. It was dangerous work, but Oberman didn’t mind the risk. He liked punching holes in the hard rock ceiling and he was perturbed by the thought that he might not get a chance to do the job he was trained for.

  Dixon passed Ed Mackay on his way back to the shuttle car and asked, “You about got that mess cleaned up?”

  “Yep. Do you want me to get that other mining machine in position?”

  “Not yet. Wait for Kevin to get back and you two can check the pillar braces in the number two connector tunnel while I get these boys started on the new face. In the mean time, go down and see if the swing shift guys left enough rock dust at the old shaft. We’re definitely gonna be needin’ some in a little while.”

  Ed put away his shovel and followed the conveyor tracks toward the mouth of the connector tunnel where supplies were kept. He was moving a little slower than usual because he’d strained his back playing with his grandchildren over the weekend and the low ceiling in the tunnel dictated that he walk in a substantial crouch. He was a few hundred feet down the conveyor path when Royce Dixon finished taping up the damaged shuttle car cable.

  “Alright, fire up that shuttle car!” Dixon yelled to Clarence Oberman.

  Cursing under his breath, Oberman reached for the shuttle car start switch, but stopped abruptly when he saw tiny sparks pulsating from under the collector ring cover. He was about to call out to Royce Dixon when Buddy Sayers loomed out of the darkness, hopped up on the shuttle car and snaked an arm around his throat. Oberman struggled to free himself from the vice-like grip, but Buddy and the Thing inside him were much too powerful. Oberman watched in horror as the Buddy-Thing’s free hand reached out and pressed the shuttle car start switch. Sparks flew from the collector ring and the area immediately exploded into a giant ball of blistering flame.

  Kevin Mackay was on his way back from the charging station when the explosion occurred. The first thing he sensed was his ears popping so badly that he actually yelped out in pain. And then the wind came, blasting down the tunnel like a hurricane, pushing smoke, dust, granulated coal and pulverized rock before it. Recalling his safety training, Kevin instinctively dropped to the floor on his stomach to duck under the onslaught, but the rushing wind grabbed him anyway and hurled him fifteen feet backwards, his hard hat banging against the rock ceiling as the force from the blast tossed him like a rag doll.

  For a moment or two Kevin thought he was dead, but he soon cast the notion aside. Dead people don’t hurt like I do, he thought through a fog of mounting pain. Lying on his back staring up at total darkness, he struggled hard to collect his thoughts. Even in his stunned condition he knew that it was vital that he should somehow pull himself together and assess the severity of the situation.

  Hours of training came flooding to mind and he concentrated on those thoughts in an effort to shut out the searing pain in his right shoulder and ribcage. It was clear to him by now that there had been an explosion somewhere near the new dig. Judging by the intensity of the blast, it had to have been methane gas that blew and a sizable concentration of it at that.
Kevin had never experienced an explosion before, but safety instructors from the OMHS&T had spent many hours going over emergency plans and survival techniques in the event of an explosion. He’d found the training classes extremely boring at the time, but he couldn’t help now feeling grateful for the training as a sifting cloud of smoke and gas descended down upon his head. He rolled to his left and groaned out loud when a stab of searing pain shot across his shoulder just below the collarbone. “That’s broke for sure,” he said through gritted teeth. His hard hat with mine light still attached lay on the floor a few feet by the shuttle car tracks. The battery had been ripped from his belt after the explosion but the bulb was still burning brightly, brightly enough for Kevin to see the thick smoke and gasses swirling in the beam of yellow light from the lamp. Gotta get my rescuer on, he said to himself, reaching to his belt with his left hand. He opened the pouch containing his CSE SR-100 self-rescuer and fumbled with the oxygen actuator tag for a few seconds. The air inside the tunnel was rapidly filling with gas and Kevin found he had to hold his breath while he struggled with the mouth piece plug. He finally managed to get the nose pads on his nose and the mouthpiece firmly in his mouth just as another wave of hot air and flying debris roared down the rail track in his direction. The blast thundered past him in an instant, peppering his face and hands with tiny shards of rock and pulverized coal. An odor accompanied the blast and Kevin recognized it as burning rubber, most likely from the shuttle car tires. The second explosion reminded him that he needed his hard hat; not just for the light it would offer but for self protection as well. His face was stinging from the debris shower he’d just had and several painful knots were rapidly growing in size and discomfort on the top of his head. He crawled on his hands and knees to his hard hat, moaning against the pain in his ribs, and quickly placed the hat on his head, wincing as the liner made contact with his injuries. His goggles were still secure on his mine belt and he took them from a carrying case and put them on. The self rescuer breathing device came equipped with a strap. Kevin wasted no time in securing the nylon strap around his midsection. Relieved to have a breath of fresh air, he sat on his knees and aimed his mine light in the direction of the elevator shaft. It was obvious that electricity had been disrupted—the overhead lights were out—and there was a fairly decent chance that most, if not all, of the permanent stoppings in the connector shafts had been blown out. If that were the case, it would be only a matter of time before thick, noxious smoke and untenable levels of carbon monoxide would replace breathable levels of oxygen throughout the mine.

  The self rescuer was designed to offer only an hour of breathable oxygen. There were larger units stored in Kennedy rescue chambers in the main part of the mine, but the problem would be getting to one. That wasn’t Kevin’s immediate worry however; his thoughts were with his uncle and the other men on the crew.

  An eerie silence had settled in after the second explosion and Kevin was sure he could hear himself breathing, even though his ears were still ringing from the initial blast. His heartbeat was audible too, thumping rhythmically in the depths of his inner ear.

  And then another sound loomed out of the darkness—the unmistakable, bone-chilling sound of a roof fall somewhere in front of him. A fresh cloud of dust and steam rolled up the tunnel and enveloped Kevin, obscuring his vision. He instinctively began crawling to his left toward the entry and almost immediately bumped into something solid.

  “Oh, Lord,” a weak voice said from the dust induced darkness. Although the voice was barely audible and laced with pain, Kevin easily recognized it as belonging to his Uncle Ed. Spitting out the rescuer mouthpiece, Kevin reached out a hand and touched his uncle on the face. “Ed? Ed, it’s me Kevin,” he said breathlessly. Swirling dust wafted into his mouth coating his lips and tongue and he coughed deeply to expel the thick coal dust from his lungs.

  “She blew up, boy,” Ed said between hacking coughs. “Knocked me plum over the conveyor track. I think my leg’s broke. I know my left wrist is, I can feel it.” Kevin settled in beside Ed training his light on the older man’s face.” Where’s your light, Ed?” he asked. Ed’s face was covered with a combination of coal dust, dried blood and dust-streaked sweat.

  “It got knocked off back yonder somewhere,” he said. “I think the lens got smashed. I couldn’t find the battery anyhow.” He took a deep breath and coughed so violently that he almost fell over from the effort.

  “You need to get you self rescuer on,” Kevin said reaching for his own mouthpiece. Ed shook his head.

  “I did put it on, but it didn’t work. Couldn’t get the dern valve to open up.” When Ed began hacking nonstop, Kevin scooted closer to him and extended his hand.

  “Here, use mine for a little while,” he said, offering Ed the mouthpiece. Ed started to refuse, but Kevin thrust the mouthpiece between the man’s lips. “I know you, you’ll argue about it for a hour or two if I let you. Just take a few deep breaths and get your wind back.” Ed leaned against the coal face and inhaled the chemical oxygen from Kevin’s SCSR unit. His leg was throbbing just above the knee and his left wrist felt as if someone had hit him with a sledgehammer. The explosion had also affected his vision to some degree—he was having trouble focusing and his right eye in particular seemed to be covered by brightly colored spots. A few moments passed and he handed the mouthpiece back to Kevin. “Feeling better?” Kevin asked. Ed nodded and shifted his body to a more comfortable position.

  “My lungs feel better but I think I ruined my leg,” he said wincing. “Guess I’m lucky it didn’t get blowed off.”

  Kevin put the mouthpiece in his mouth and took a couple of shallow breaths. “We’re gonna have to move from here,” he said after a few moments. “Carbon monoxide’s gonna keeping building up and this rescuer ain’t gonna last long.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Ed said. “We ought to go back down the track and check on the other guys. There might be someone still alive down there, but I highly doubt it.” They passed the mouthpiece back and forth and Kevin said,

  “Regardless, we should find a spot in one of the rooms off two and put up a barrier. After that, maybe we can still find a way out through one of the man doors and make it to the Kennedy Chamber.”

  “I was gonna check on the other guys before but the smoke was too thick up there,” Ed said. “So, I just started crawling toward the connector entrance. That’s when I saw your mine light.”

  They shared the mouthpiece for a while longer and Kevin turned toward Ed. “What do you think happened?” he asked. Ed shrugged and rubbed his injured leg.

  “Methane for sure,” he said. “ I was headed down the conveyor belt to check the rock dust level when she blew. I have to say that one of the machines sparked it. Either the miner or a shuttle car. My lord, Chet was on that number two shuttle car. His wife just had a little one you know.”

  “Let’s just hope for the best,” Kevin said. “You ready?”

  The two men crawled along parallel to the conveyor belt, stopping occasionally to share the rescuer mouthpiece. The air became denser and more toxic as they neared the entrance to the new coal dig. They were just about to move on toward the elevator when Kevin’s light picked up a crumpled shape lying on the floor between the two tunnels. They knew what it was instantly—Royce Dixon was still wearing his white foreman’s hat. The fire from the explosion had scorched it to some degree but there was enough white paint left intact for Kevin and Ed to know for sure that they had just discovered what was left of their foreman.

  “My gracious,” Ed said, choking on his words. Kevin hurried to Dixon’s side but stopped short when he saw the man’s blistered, blackened face. “It’s too late for him,” Ed said. “We should check on the others and then get ourselves back to that elevator.”

  Kevin nodded his agreement and the two men moved through the thick veil of gas and dust to where they had last seen the other miners. They didn’t get far, though; a huge pile of limestone rock and virgin coal lay across th
e track blocking the way into the new dig area and the elevator beyond.

  “Shit, Ed said. “We’re trapped for sure.” He looked over his shoulder toward the tunnel leading to the connector feed line. “Maybe we can back track through number three and ride one of the Joy buggies out to the main entrance,” he suggested. Kevin was dubious.

  “We ain’t got much air left in this rescue unit, Ed. We’d do better tryin’ to make it to that Kennedy Chamber in two.” A Kennedy Chamber was a self-contained metal unit that housed breathable oxygen, food and water and a telephone that, with any luck, could contact someone above ground.

  “I don’t know if I can make it that far,” Ed said groaning. “This leg of mine is ruined. Think I’m bleedin’ inside too. Dern bad luck all around.”

  Kevin offered Ed a hit off the rescuer, took a breath himself and tied the strap from the oxygen unit around Ed’s belt loop. “Alright, uncle, we’re gettin’ out of here,” he said. “I’ll go slow, but you gotta try and keep up with me.”

  “Okay, but don’t move too fast.”

  “We really don’t have a choice, Ed, the O2 level in this thing is in the red.”

  They moved out in a crouch, hugging the side of the tunnel, stopping only long enough to take a quick breath from the self-rescuer. Ed stumbled and fell on a couple of occasions, but Kevin hauled him to his feet and pulled him along, encouraging him to keep moving with a half-hearted thumbs up that Ed could barely see through the impenetrable wall of dust.

  They reached the entrance to the number two tunnel and hurried down the track as quickly as they could under the circumstances. The Kennedy Chamber was in view and, given the fact that the rescue unit was nearly on dead empty, Kevin couldn’t help but sigh with relief.

  His relief vanished instantly, however, when he saw a large, dark shape looming out of the murky darkness off to his left. Before he could turn around, Buddy Sawyers threw himself on Ed Mackay and sank his teeth into the man’s throat. Ed and Buddy went down in a heap and disappeared from Kevin’s sight as the swirling mist of dust and methane gas consumed them.