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' '1 <br />Date: December 6, 2001 <br />TO: Sandy Brown, David Berry, Steve Renner, John Barton <br />FROM: Dan Mathews <br />RE: Methane Fire Incident at Roadside North Portals <br />On returning from to the office from the field on the morning of December 6, <br />I had a number of phone messages regarding a fire which had occurred on <br />Monday, December 3 at the Roadside North Portal. From what I gathered <br />from Tonya Hammond of PCC, methane venting through the partially <br />dismantled fan shaft frame structure at the North Portal had ignited. Fire <br />crews from Palisade and Grand Junction had put the fire out, and MSHA <br />had been on the scene directing control and abatement efforts. I made <br />arrangements to meet Tonya at the site, and John Barton of the DMG Mine <br />Safety and Training Program volunteered to accompany me. We arrived at <br />the portal site at approximately 11:30 a.m. <br />John took a number of methane readings as documented in his report <br />below, all of which were below the combustible concentration, and took a <br />couple photographs with his digital camera. Tonya Hammond explained <br />that she discovered the fire at around gam, Monday December 3, <br />emanating from the remaining intact portion of the fan shaft frame structure <br />(just in front of the loader in the first picture below). <br />Fire department crews extinguished the fire by pumping foam retardant into <br />the shaft from a highwall bench above. The shaft had been sealed at the <br />base with dirt from inside the mine prior to initial backfilling of the portal <br />openings, but apparently cracks in the soil fill had allowed methane to <br />concentrate within the shaft and frame structure. Tonya indicated that <br />MSHA's preliminary determination was that the source of the ignition may <br />have been smoldering residue from cutting torch operations several weeks <br />previously, but I have no first hand knowledge of that. <br />I will be getting a written report of the incident from Tonya, and I will contact <br />MSHA to get copies of their reports. The sequence as I understand it is <br />that after the flame was extinguished by the foam retardant, PCC as <br />directed by MSHA poured concrete inside the frame to fill the shaft and <br />backfilled with dirt around the outside base of the frame structure. Tonya <br />