South Yorkshire Times — Saturday, 19 June 1943.
Transfusion Team’s Work after Cadeby Colliery accident
The excellent work of a blood transfusion team when four men lost their lives through a steam tank bursting at Cadeby Colliery on March 27th was referred to by Dr. W. S. Stanbury (North-Eastern Regional Blood Transfusion Officer), when broadcasting last week in the B.B.C.’s “Health Magazine” feature.
Dr. Stanbury said a mobile team of the Regional Blood Transfusion Service was visiting a South Yorkshire first aid post to collect blood from volunteer donors at Cadeby Colliery.
After a hard morning’s work, the team with their staff nurse and medical officer, were enjoying their noon-hour break on the sunny mound of Conisbrough Castle. Suddenly, the quiet scene was shattered by a tremendous explosion, followed by a great cloud of steam rising from the pit-head of Cadeby Colliery and rolling down the valley of the River Don far below.
Within a few minutes the team was passing through the crowd at the colliery gates where the ambulances waited. A large steam receiving tank, twenty feet high and ten feet wide, had burst; the steam rushing out horizontally and hurling the great reservoir high into the air.
Four men, working nearby, were severely injured and scalded from head to foot.
Girls help at hospital
Dr. Stanbury said that following the ambulances to the nearby miners’ hospital (Fullerton), the team’s assistance was gladly accepted by the three local doctors and the matron. Girls who had never before witnessed such injuries went silently and efficiently to work. These girls of the British Red Cross Society, St. John Ambulance Brigade and Civil Nursing Reserve acquitted themselves in a manner which would have been a credit to women with three or four years’ general hospital training. One girl, who particularly distinguished herself, had only the week before fainted when asked to dress a boil. She and her mates remained cool, efficient and resourceful, cutting away water-soaked clothing, dressing the burned areas with triple dye and assisting with the transfusions and oxygen therapy.
He said, unfortunately two of the casualties died shortly after admission. The remaining two reacted encouragingly to plasma transfusion. Late that evening, when the team returned to the first aid post, no fewer than 82 miners were waiting to give their blood. The first aid post doctor and the colliery manager, realising the probable loss to the service through the suspension of that day’s already scheduled transfusion sessions, arranged with the local clergymen and Home Guard Commandant for the announcement that a special Sunday session would be held at the local cinema.
In simple words he told the story of the accident and how the teams had worked to save the lives of the four men. His audience of miners and miners’ families rose to their seats and cheered. The following day 255 miners reported at the hospital’s out-patient department to make their contributions as volunteer blood donors.
A “South Yorkshire Times” reporter was informed this week that the blood transfusion team was operating from Leeds, and valuable assistance was given by the staff of Fullerton Hospital.
The public inquest on the four men has not yet been held. Victims were: Joseph Pearson (32), fitter, of 3, Ravenfield Street, Denaby; William Haynes Sturgess (52), surface worker, of 24, Braithwell Street, Denaby; Joseph Laxton Lunn (56), surface worker, of 28, Doncaster Road, Conisbrough; and Ernest Senior (41), surface worker, of 9, Castle Grove, Conisbrough.