The plans to block Magpie Sough in Derbyshire could have resulted in a similar situation, albeit with less domestic disruption, but it shows what can happen if it's 'bottled up' instead of let out in a controlled fashion. Deep shafts are one thing, but adits at the bases of hills surely need some water management.
Similar situations to this happened regularly in Sheffield in the 19th century as the seams got close to river-level (coinciding with rabid urban development at the same altitude), but as the seams dipped ever deeper and further east, the problem went underground. But the canal emptied once when the floor of the basin collapsed into a coal mine three feet below it. The River Sheaf also disappeared for three days when the main culvert wall (now called Megatron) failed. It then reappeared 'everywhere' in Attercliffe a mile downstream, considerably darker than when it went in.
A load of just-sub-surface pillar-and-stall workings from the 18th century were filled with concrete by the council last year at the base of Skye Edge here, but this was more to prevent subsidence for the dwellings higher up the slope than for ochre flooding - but most of the woods on the south side where I am have orange streams flowing in them all year round. This one below in Whiteley Wood is almost certainly derived from seams upslope worked at the nearby Greystones Colliery, and emanates from a blocked opening a few metres above a slabbed drain that always runs clear. The weir used to serve Leather Wheel, now filled in and levelled.
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