168 Men Lost - America's Greatest Hard Rock Mining Disaster

                                                                                                                                                                                        Photo: Banjodog

Half an hour before midnight on the 8th of June 1917, one simple, wrong move in a single, split second a half-mile below ground sparked what was then the worst hard-rock mining disaster in U.S. history.

Today, a century later, the Granite Mountain fire in Butte still holds that infamous distinction, even though there is no consensus on the precise number of lives it took. The numbers, skewed by confusion and uncertainty, range from 163 to 173.

Many miners were killed within minutes, others died in the dark hours and hours later — some more than two days later — succumbing to poisonous gases or simply exhausting every last bit of that most precious, basic requirement for life — oxygen.

...history lives on, especially in Butte, and even 100 years has not softened two tragic ironies about the disaster: It was during efforts to make the mine safer that it all began, and it was because the mine was ventilated so well — usually a great thing — that flames and deadly smoke spread so fast.  

--  The Missoulian  June 8, 2017