Another 'standard performance' at ČSM Mine

ČSM Mine – An absolute elite among the coal hewing gangs at CSM Mine in Stonava is represented by the crew of chief headman Karel Szczotka from Section 3 South, headed by Luděk Malášek. Just judge for yourselves: With the present gang boss the team has been working for nine years and for that period, has succeeded in putting in a total of 27 'standard performances'!

At this last occasion, the headman received congratulations from General Manager Josef Kasper, Production Manager Miroslav Puček and other members of the management on Wednesday, November 5. With a GŠ 68B cutter-loader and type DVP 7 mine supports applied at face #300 316 of 179 cm average thickness and 165 meters length, Szczotka's miners have extracted a total of 39,697 tons of coal over a period of 31 workdays, having advanced 94.65 m. The volume actually extracted was 2,497 tons higher than planned.

„Well yes, this has been an outstanding performance, but the thing is we can't do it otherwise any longer,“ was the „modest“ comment on this yet another success of the gang by Section Head Luděk Malášek. „In fact, these 'standard performances' have become standard already,“ he added teasingly.

Deservedly, he had good reason indeed to be in the best of moods.  Because this most recent 'standard' had not come easily at all. The men working in the section let themselves be worked up to doing it because until completion of extraction at the given working face #300 316, all driving work required to reach the next working face at no. 32 seam was blocked, and that is where the new cutter-loader complex, Bucyrus, is to be implemented within the POP 2010 program. It is clear as daylight that the mine had an eminent interest in a speedy completion of extraction work there.

„But the nature intervened, putting obstacles in our way,“ Luděk Malášek describes the situation that prevailed underground. „Total devastation of the exhaust roadway and incoherence of overburden rock made extraction difficult beyond expectations throughout the entire no. 30. seam. Every roof collapse makes it necessary to drive in planar TH type supports and apply cribbing. The sections required constant straightening while the return airway had to be maintained in order to for us be able at least to crawl through, when walking was beyond question. It was like attending an on-the-job mining university, a huge amount of conscientious mining work. And I also have to take off my hat to the deftness and skill of the workers of those shops that were backing us – without them we could not have achieved anything.“

Finishing extraction at #300 316 face was planned for the first half of this week. The next working to be tackled by Szczotka's gang will be the #294 314 face. „Some of our gang had been moved there already, to handle working face accessories. We should launch extraction there during the second half of the month,“ specified Luděk Malášek.

(Bohuslav Krzyžanek)