Fire boss

A fire boss is a person employed at a mine or state certified official, responsible for examining a mine for dangers, particularly explosive, poisonous or suffocating gases. Usually the fire boss is the first person to enter a mine, to verify its safety, before a shift crew enters. It may also loosely refer to a foreman or shift manager for the miners.

Origins

In the early days of mining the fire boss would wear thick clothing, usually soaked in water, and walk through the mine with a lit candle affixed to a long stick. If there were pockets of explosive gases the candle would ignite them, often not sparing the boss on the other end. Less dangerous methods are used today such as pumping air into the mine to dilute the levels of dangerous gases (see explosive limit).

gollark: Well, scene, not room.
gollark: It does seem like there should be a way to patch extra content into existing room descriptions, though.
gollark: In terms of patching it into the cube area, perhaps you could walk around a bit after you get some lighting, and find a door or something.
gollark: Also, did you fix the bit which was in the first person?
gollark: Yes, I suppose that the other cube interactions are mostly related to the cube in some way.
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