Zeche Heinrich Robert / Bergwerk Ost. Hamm, Germany – November 2015.
The culmination of our trip to France, Belgium and Germany in November. I've popped it in non public so that I could write a bit about it without the euro naming stuff, plus means that if people want to, they can go and see it – 10/10 would recommend.
"Security begins in your head"
This was/is one of the last deep coal mines of the Ruhr situated in Hamm (twinned with Bradford) The mine was the main extraction point for the sprawling 'Ost' mine. The complex is of a typical style of the Ruhr mines with signs of expansion and evolution from the original buildings from when the shafts were first sunk in 1901, through to the red steel frame / dark brick infill construction buildings from the 50's, typical of the Ruhr mines. The remaining extraction headstock is of a “Hammerkopfturm” (Hammer head tower) design by Fritz Schupp, a celebrated German Industrial Architect who was also responsible for the design of the enormous coal mecca at Zeche Zollverein in Essen, now a UNESCO world heritage site.
Since 2010, I've had a bit of an obsession with the mines of the Ruhr and have visited the area on several separate occasions to explore the mines and other industries there, and making a few close friends over there along the way. Here's some of the reports in no particular order:
Bergwerk West
Zeche Hugo
Bergwerk Lohberg
Zeche General Blumenthal Schacht an der Haard
Zeche Ewald Forsetzung
Zeche Grube Gottelborn
Schachtenlange Rossenray
Zeche Schlagen & Eisen / Zeche Polsum
Anyway, probably enough waffle. Our main objective was to climb our way up the enormous winding tower, which involved a hairy 2 storey free climb up some machinery due to locked staircases, leaving our usual favourite method of ascension out of the question. The weather was fucking atrocious and the wind was banging bits of window into other bits of window from the side of the headstock occasionally making an almighty smashing noise.
Rather frustratingly there was no access to the Changing area (Kaue) which is what we'd also been aiming for as it is probably one of the nicest in existence. Must have spent almost an hour and half trying different methods fiddling with windows on every elevation and climbing onto the roof all to no avail. We finally ending up hiding in a bush to avoid the security guards, at that point with thought we'd pushed our luck far enough and left to find Ruhrfruhstuck and mullermilch.
Here's a photo of it by my mate Jan who was a bit luckier than us.
Photos: Mainly from the Förderturm (headstock) with a few from around and about. Interesting to see a 1:1 scale model intersection of the below ground workings. It was too dark in the washery to take photos, so I didn't.
"I stand for coal"
Glück auf!
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