No record was found in the MSHA Fatality Archive Database, and the CDC/NIOSH Disaster List incorrectly indicates 8 deaths were attributed to this accident.
Catastrophe in Iowa
Logansport Reporter, Indiana
February 16, 1893
Des Moines, Ia., Feb. 16. -- By an explosion of dust ignited by a shot in the Cedar Mines, 2 miles from Albia, Wednesday, one man, Joseph Gallagher, was killed and ten others seriously burned in their faces and hands, and as many more received lesser wounds. About one hundred men were in the mines at the time, and but for the fact that they were close to the cold-air shaft many would have been killed.
The man who fired the shot, Joseph Gallagher, was beheaded by the explosion, and the coal dust igniting, shot a flame for 100 feet above, throwing all the miners within that distance to the floor, rendering some unconscious.
