Work resumes at site of abandoned mines
Work resumed at an old Dunbar mine site Wednesday after three men were overcome by carbon monoxide while working in the abandoned limestone mines Tuesday morning. State officials said Thursday that Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) experts, along with officials from the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), ventilated the mine throughout the night Tuesday and ran several sweeps of the mine Wednesday with handheld air monitors.
Tom Rathbun, DEP spokesman, said following the tests, DEP officials concluded the mine was safe for miners and work resumed Wednesday afternoon.
The three men, employees of Dynamic Materials Corp. (DMC), were taken Tuesday morning to Pittsburgh hospitals for treatment.
According to officials Thursday, two of the men were released Tuesday from area hospitals and the third man, Stanley Wolfe of Lemont Furnace, who underwent more extensive hyperbaric treatment, was released from UPMC-Presbyterian hospital in Pittsburgh on Wednesday, hospital officials said.
DMC, according to its Web site, is the world’s leading provider of explosion-welded clad metal plates, by using explosives to fuse metals.
The company is currently working in the old Dupont limestone mines on Dunbar-Ohiopyle Road.
Rathbun said the DEP will conduct further tests at the mine site and said possible “written recommendations” could be forthcoming to help avoid a similar accident in the future.
“It is obvious the three men encountered a high carbon monoxide environment in an isolated area,” Rathbun said.
According to Rathbun, not much carbon monoxide gas would be moving through the old mine and added that the area the men entered was probably left over from work when the mine was open.
Rathbun said the key to treating carbon monoxide poisoning is infusing the patient with oxygen to break the carbon monoxide bonds on the blood platelets.
Forensic pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht said in an unrelated interview earlier this year that carbon monoxide is not actually poisonous, but the body’s reaction to the oxygen deprivation caused by the gas is what results in illness.
Wecht said during oxygen deprivation, the oxygen is displaced from the iron compounds in red blood cells and said that the carbon monoxide then displaces the oxygen in the air needed to breath.
Several calls to DMC on Wednesday and Thursday went unreturned.