waste of millions of pounds

[phil0254]

i worked at shirebrook colliery [derbyshire] on the very last day in 1993 one of my mates was a deputy in the blackshale seam he told about the last few hours of the colliery life on that morning the fitters were putting the cutting picks into a brand new rangeing drum shearer the electrition was powering it up ready to turn coal everything was brand new, the chocks on the face cost about 1 million each,the stage loader was  new panzer was new everything on that panel was new then at eleven oclock they was told the colliery was closeing. the blackshale seam had only been opened about 6 months 2 panels 1 running   and the new panel must have cost billions to open the seam alone, the other seams piper, deepsoft. main brights, and main hard .ie clowne were told to fill all the underground bunkers whitch they did in the last 2 weeks of the collierys life... its now sports direct nothing to show of the colliery or its life  what a waste of money and the government are saying we have to tighen our belts theres no money to spare down right stupidity i say

[John]

Nov 7, 2014 9:58:20 GMT -5 phil0254 said:

i worked at shirebrook colliery [derbyshire] on the very last day in 1993 one of my mates was a deputy in the blackshale seam he told about the last few hours of the colliery life on that morning the fitters were putting the cutting picks into a brand new rangeing drum shearer the electrition was powering it up ready to turn coal everything was brand new, the chocks on the face cost about 1 million each,the stage loader was  new panzer was new everything on that panel was new then at eleven oclock they was told the colliery was closeing. the blackshale seam had only been opened about 6 months 2 panels 1 running   and the new panel must have cost billions to open the seam alone, the other seams piper, deepsoft. main brights, and main hard .ie clowne were told to fill all the underground bunkers whitch they did in the last 2 weeks of the collierys life... its now sports direct nothing to show of the colliery or its life  what a waste of money and the government are saying we have to tighen our belts theres no money to spare down right stupidity i say

Face equipping would have been around 15 million pounds back then, still not to be sniffed at, and that's not taking into account development costs. In the 1980's my company spent $135,000, that's Oz dollars, on each Dowty powered support, 135 installed, several as spares, plus a load of spare parts for them. They were all imported from the UK, as Dowty Wolleng, couldn't compete on the contract bid, due mostly to the fact Australian steel was far more expensive than UK steel, and the total cost of the bid included shipping to Sydney... How Maggie could have closed both the steelmaking and coal industries down still makes a rational person shake their heads.



I don't know if you recall Bill Riley, your Safety Officer, known as ragger on this site, he did relate to how the NCB/BC made Shirebrook drown in "red ink"