NIOSHTIC-2 Publications Search
A Personal Miner's Carbon Monoxide Alarm.
Paper in Proceedings of the Ninth WVU Internat'lmining Electrotechnology Conf Morgantown WV :9 pages
Underground miners may be exposed to hazardous quantities of toxic gases such as carbon monoxide (co) generated from mine fires or explosions. Every underground miner is required to carry a filter self-rescuer (fsr) that when operated will remove CO from the miner's breathing air. In addition every underground miner must maintain near his or her work site a self-contained self-rescuer (scsr) that, when activated, will supply breathing oxygen. In many situations, a miner does not know when to don either self-rescuer, since he does not know there is a fire in the mine. Usually he does not carry instrumentation necessary for the detection of the toxic, colorless, and odorless fire product carbon monoxide If each miner carried a personal CO alarm that would respond to preset concentrations of CO, the miner would then be alerted to don his fsr or scsr and exit the mine. A prototype personal miner's CO alarm called pem-coal has been developed by the U.S. Bureau of Mines. The pem-coal unit is small enough to be carried on a miner's belt, has a flash lamp visual alarm, requires no calibration for use, and uses a chemical sensor that changes color by reaction with trace quantities of carbon monoxide The chemical sensor was tested at concentrations of CO from 10 ppm to 1,000 ppm, at temperatures from 5 deg. C to 40 deg. C, and with several potential mine gas interferents. The response times of the pemcoal unit are sufficiently quick to warn a miner before he is exposed to hazardous quantities of carbon monoxide
Paper in Proceedings of the Ninth WVU Internat'lmining Electrotechnology Conf. Morgantown, WV
Page last reviewed: April 12, 2019
Content source: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Education and Information Division