Coal Mining the Modern Way: Newcastle, 1957

A silent newsreel item from 1957 about mechanised coal mining procedures at the Awaba State Coal Mine, near Newcastle in New South Wales.
The item opens with shots of miners going down into, and later leaving, the mine. We see older footage of miners underground using picks and shovels to break up the coal and load it onto carts. A pit pony takes the coal away. The newsreel contrasts this with the modern methods of cutting coal from the coalface using a machine. Two miners bore a hole in the coalface and set explosives. Coal is loaded into a truck using a mechanical loader and taken to storage bins by a locomotive. A conveyor belt takes the coal from the mine to the Crusher Shed where it is transported away by truck.
Coal Mining the Modern Way, Newcastle, NSW, 1957.
NFSA title: 128513

[@drewmanchoo]

Brutal work. Hot, dangerous, loud. short lived life, with white-finger, industrial deafness and black lung.

[@gunnersteinbeck235]

The name of the mine is "State Mine Awaba" which is in the Lake Macquarie Council area, not Newcastle.

[@claymack1109]

They get to wear fuckin shorts to work that is amazing to me

[@kilroy7562]

Kilroy was here

[@maureenhough4622]

research

[@laurenking9265]

Maureen Hough pap

[@godfreypoon5148]

@@laurenking9265 dookieburger