Mining Laws of Ohio, 1921 | Page 9

vertical shaft in a mine car. When the vertical shaft is less than fifty feet in depth, and a stairway approved by the district inspector of mines is not provided, the owner, lessee or agent shall be required to lower or hoist persons, as above prescribed, but when such stairway is provided, the hoisting of persons shall not be required.
Sec. 930. [=Owner, lessee or agent shall provide second opening.=] The owner, lessee or agent of a mine shall not employ or permit any person to work therein except as hereinafter provided, unless to every seam worked in such mine there are at least two openings, separated by natural strata of not less than one hundred feet in breadth at any point, by which distinct means of ingress and egress are always available to the persons therein employed. Such openings need not belong to the same mine so long as the persons employed therein have safe, ready and available means of ingress and egress, by not less than two openings, provided, however, that no air shaft with a ventilating furnace at the bottom be designated or used as a means of ingress or egress. The provisions of this section shall not apply to opening a new mine while being worked for the purpose of making the second opening and the communication therewith, and the making of the landing or bottom and extending of the main entries one hundred feet while such communication is being made; to a mine in which the second opening has become unavailable from any cause while said second opening is being restored or another is being made; nor to a mine in which the second opening has become unavailable by reason of the final robbing of the pillars previous to abandonment, so long as not more than twenty persons in either case are employed therein at one time.
[=Fire protection to shafts.=] At each mine at which the only means of egress is by vertical shaft, the owner, lessee or agent shall provide adequate fire protection to secure the safety of such shaft, or shafts, and, when but one shaft is the only available means of egress, shall keep in attendance a competent person at all times while persons are inside of such mine. (Penalty, Sec. 976.)
Sec. 931. [=Separate traveling ways.=] The owner, lessee or agent of a mine shall provide and maintain, in safe condition for the purpose provided, two separate and distinct traveling ways from the interior workings of the mine, each of which shall be available to not less than one opening to the surface. One of such traveling ways may be designated by such owner, lessee or agent as the principal traveling way. One of such traveling ways may be designated as the escapement way. The provisions of this section shall not prohibit such owner, lessee or agent from designating more than one principal traveling way, or more than one escapement way, so long as the provisions hereof are complied with.
[=Traveling ways and refuge holes.=] The owner, lessee or agent of a mine worked by shaft, shall provide and keep free from obstruction, a traveling or passage way from one side of the shaft bottom to the other. Slopes and mechanical haulage ways used as traveling ways by persons employed in a mine shall be made of a sufficient width to give not less than three feet of space between the rib and adjacent rail of track to permit persons to pass moving cars with safety. If found impracticable to make such slopes or mechanical haulage ways of sufficient width as provided, refuge holes not less than six feet in width and clearing the adjacent rail of the track not less than four feet, and not more than sixty feet apart, shall be made on one side of the slope or mechanical haulage way and whitewashed. The refuge holes shall be kept free from obstruction, and the roof and sides made secure. (Sec. 932, 959; Penalty, Sec. 976.)
Sec. 932. [=Detached locomotive from moving train. Traveling way where locomotive is detached.=] At a mine, or in any part thereof, where a locomotive is detached from a moving train of cars for the purpose of dropping such cars past the locomotive, and the haulage way at such point is designated as the principal traveling way, a traveling way, not less than three feet wide and separated from the track by a pillar of coal or substantial fence, shall be provided at one side of that portion of the track from where the locomotive will be detached to the switch of the siding. Such traveling way shall be made on the same side of the track as the refuge holes. In no case shall a locomotive be detached from a train of moving cars, for the purpose