Dear Roger,
You mention Dynamite, but do you mean Gelignite that you recorded/smelt?
In great brief: both contain Nitro Glycerine to varying degrees and
combined with different things and Nitrous fumes will be given off by both. I
have never experienced anything connected with Dynamite as a specific 'breed'
of explosive, but, indeed, the smell you describe as being of marzipan is a
pretty good description of what one gets with Gelignite - the smell is also
similar in a heading or any u/g workplace after it has been ventilated to
clear the main 'smoke'/dust/nitrous fumes. Nitro Glycerine and Nitrous
fumes also induce headaches - varying severity depending on the concentration
and the individual - but proper ventilation prevents most of this affect
(those just regularly handling nitro explosives in the early days suffered
just as much as those using it).
As to why well diggers would go back down a well before the workplace had
been properly ventilated: this basically due to speed/haste and lack of
understanding in the correct usage of the explosive - it mustn't be forgotten
that Dynamite was only just starting to come into 'regular' use during the
1880's. There being not quite so much 'smoke' involved as with Blasting
Powder, with those using Dynamite at that time feeling/thinking it was more
'workable in'... not realising it was the fumes that would kill them as
opposed to the voluminous sulphurous smoke of B.Powder. There is also the affect
of the expulsion of air in a confined space due to the detonation - as
opposed to the much 'slower' 'rending' affect of B.Powder. (This 'explanation'
is very basic).
There were many 'suffocation' deaths underground - various circumstances -
such as you describe all around the World, mostly due to lack of proper
ventilation &/or impatience in returning to the workplace - very particularly
a confined workplace obviously.
Hope this useful, but, as said, it is only the very bare bones.
Regards, Bernard
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