Adrian,
        I plead guilty to spouting off without knowing enough about UK
conditions (cavers, mines, and government).  I apologize to you and
especially to your rescue teams.
        No matter what I intended, much of what I said was obviously
unjustified.  Our British Columbia situation is much different from
yours.  Rescue teams are constantly being called out to search for
people who go outside of the marked boundaries on ski slopes, wander
into avalanche areas in our mountains, and climb over protective fences
to fall into our canyons.  None of these are cavers and I had no right
concluding that cavers were this type of individual.  As far as I know
caving is rather limited in this area.  Rock climbing is another matter,
and here a few irresponsible types do exist.
        Our mines are also another matter.  My experience was in hard
rock mining, and I hope to be getting a report within a few weeks about
the current condition of the mine from a young friend who is still
mining there.
        50 years ago, the Sullivan Mine was only 35 years old.  It was
worked as four separate sections, and had sixty miles of working track
(as well as at least 200 miles of abandoned drifts).  The ore body was a
block about two miles across and several hundred feet between footwall
and hanging wall, lying on a slant.  Although I worked only in older
workings from the 3900 foot level to the 4700 foot level, the mine
extended down to 2800 feet above sea level. In 1950, 10,000 tons of ore
a day was being taken out of the mine.  I understand that similar
production has been carried on for most of the last 50 years.
        In the oldest sections, the ore was taken out from large "rooms"
with pillars left between to support the back (which was very stable).
The small stope I worked in was 50 feet high, and extended 150 feet
between two pillars and 225 feet between the other two (If this sounds
exaggerated, I can refer you to two pictures of our stope on the B.C.
archives web site).  Such stopes extended for over a mile in one
direction and at least half a mile in the other. When backfilling proved
impractical, those older pillars were taken out by open pit mining, but
stopes in lower regions were taken out by diamond drill blasting and
other techniques which did not necessitate retaining a stable back.
        The largest opening I ever saw was an old stope that was being
used for dumping waste (there was no thought of backfilling the stope).
While installing guard rails at one of the dumps, we could see other
dumps across from us four hundred feet away.  I really don't know how
deep this hole was, but we could see two lighted dumps below our level
(100 feet between levels) and two lighted dumps above our level.
        Apparently, many pillars have been removed by drilling them and
blasting them into draw holes beneath.  Even in 1950, some areas of the
mine had been undermined and were bulkheaded off so that noone would be
caught in a cave-in.  In the last stope in which I worked (which was
admittedly much smaller in scope) we were using a long wall method in
rotten surface rock which required a retreat form of mining.  Somehow, I
can't picture this mine being very stable when mining is completed in
two years.
        Combine this with the fact that this honeycombed mountain lies
in the rocky mountains where mountain building is still in progress and
whole mountains have been known to shear off (The Frank Slide and the
Hope Slide - though the latter is not in the Rockies) and I don't
apologize for considering any rock to be unstable.  Two "Glory Holes"
existed at Phoenix, B.C. and one stope adjacent to our own had caved to
the surface.
        What I really wanted to quarrel with, however, was the idea of
blaming governments and mining companies for sealing off mines when they
were finished with them.  Again, law suits are not as common in the UK
as in North America.
        I am really sorry if I appeared to be considering miners better
than anybody else.
While I do object to a common view of them as being a "bunch of drunken
bums" as our newpapers have historically labelled loggers and miners, I
tried to make the point that we (and in this case I believe I can speak
for most miners) were mercenaries quite willing to be a part of the
tearing up of the environment.  I certainly never saw any miners
refusing to do anything that might harm the environment.  Because our
mines and our towns are relatively far apart, we got away with it.  I
can understand why some people are antagonistic to mining; although much
more is currently being done to restore damaged areas.
        Again, our governments are much less reliable than yours.
British Columbia governments have continually taken funds earmarked for
one purpose and used them for another. In this country, mining is
presently in great disrepute. It is doubtful that a lot of government
funds will be spent on mining museums.
        Although we do have a few places where mining artifacts were put
on proper display, many of them were carried hundreds of miles away to
be put in private tourist museums for atmospere - with no attempt to
catalogue them or keep them in any kind of repair.  While I bemoaned the
fact, you are right, I did little to prevent it.  But there was and is
little public support to press the government to become involved.
        One last thing.  While the rule in rescue work (and here I am
not thinking of just mine rescue) was never to risk a life for a dead
body, I can think of many situations in which rescuers did risk their
lives for live people, and at Westray they really stretched the
possibility of someone being alive.  Stories of rescuers losing their
lives rescuing others are common.  Rescue personnel, be they
professionals or amateurs are all heroes.



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