Chapter V: Isle of Iron, Men of Steel  (continued)

By 1905 the Dominion company occupied a comfortable position, as its Lower Bed covered an extensive land area and gave no signs of imminent exhaustion. Land reserves of the Scotia company's Middle Bed, however, were nearly gone. In order to continue mining, the company was going to have to reach out beneath Conception Bay.

Scotia officials viewed the prospect of submarine mining with great trepidation. Apart from the obvious drawback of increased production costs, it meant having to drill through the shoreline Dominion claims to the offshore Scotia property. Nevertheless, there was little choice. The two companies signed an agreement allowing a Scotia tunnel passage through the Dominion territory, and in May 1909 excavations began.

Starting point of the submarine tunnel was the Scotia's Number 2 slope, already being mined on land. Between May and December 1906 miners advanced a cautious average of four feet per day along the Middle Bed. A few novices at first misunderstood the reason for their labours: one young man thought that the tunnel was an elaborate fishing technique whereby he could sneak up on the fish from underneath! Most miners knew better, of course, but their knowledge did nothing to dispel their anxiety in August when they encountered a fault that threw the Middle Bed up to a mere 85 feet below the bottom of Conception Bay. Further progress revealed a second fault; it brought the bed back into line, but greatly increased the volume of water seepage into the mine. Years later a group of miners recalled their qualms of the day in a song:

"Ye Men that works down in this cave,
Your courage must be more than brave,
To work a mine beneath the wave,
Wabana you're a corker."⁽¹⁵⁾

Stronger than the miners' fears was their faith in Robert Chambers. He urged them on with assurances that the cover would increase and the waters subside, and they pushed forward with gathering speed. The tunnel reached the Scotia territory about a mile from land and at a depth of 413 feet. The miners and company officials were jubilant.

The Scotia company soon found another cause for celebration, for an exploratory shaft sunk through the tunnel bottom showed that the Lower Bed had increased in thickness and quality. By adjusting the tunnel's length and direction the miners intersected the Lower Bed, thus giving the company two workable ore strata.

Somewhat to the surprise of all concerned, submarine mining presented few problems not found in normal underground mining. The water leaked less than was anticipated, and engineers adapted the usual room-and-pillar method by leaving wider pillars to support the larger overburden of rock and water. The major difficulty entailed hauling the ore up the slope at an efficient rate. This the company solved by buying 22½-ton orecars that made up in tonnage what they lacked in speed.

Yet miners could not help but feel adverse psychological effects from working in the submarine tunnels, which eventually came to reach out three miles under Conception Bay:

"Down in those dark and weary deeps,
Where the drills do hum and the rats do squeak,
Day after day, week after week,
Wabana you're a corker.