1-158-970 - Oxford Science Archive/Heritage Images

Coal mining accident, Seaham Colliery, County Durham, 1880 (c1895). Men being lowered down the pit shaft in a coal tub to begin rescue operations after the disaster of September 1880. The men are carrying Davy safety lamps and are watched by anxious relatives of the men trapped or dead underground. The disaster, caused by a gas explosion, claimed the lives of 164 men and boys, as well as some 150 ponies. From Der Stein der Weisen. (Leipzig, c1895).