Coal mine simulator at Glace Bay museum transports visitors on emotional journey

Readers sit in a mine cart surrounded by screens even though Angus, the virtual manual, leads the way and explains Cape Breton’s vast mining heritage as perfectly as how the do the job was completed.

“I think a great deal of community persons who’ve been in this article in advance of or have not been in this article in advance of may want to come and try this. Anybody who’s acquired mining in their relatives, and that is just about all of us, really needs to practical experience this simulator,” reported Mary Pat Mombourquette, government director of the museum.

The museum is also home to a authentic mine that readers can take a look at with a manual, but the simulator offers accessibility for persons with mobility problems who can’t go down in the mine.

Eric Spencer, a museum manual who expended thirty several years functioning as a miner in the location, said hearing the narrator communicate about mining brings back reminiscences of his previous career.

“The narrator begins conversing about the relationship and what he misses about functioning in the mine, and this is the factor: he would not skip the coal mining sector, but he misses the miners, the camaraderie,” he reported.

“It variety of brings a lump to your throat.”

Spencer reported it is been entertaining to watch readers seeking out the simulator, primarily when they start off to listen to some of the appears, together with a pair of explosions. 

“You see them bounce out of their seats — catches them by surprise — but then you get a big puff of smoke coming out the front of the display from the explosion. It really is reasonable,” he reported.

Mombourquette reported $one.seven million was expended on the challenge and it is hoped the new attraction will bring in much more readers.

The pandemic has not been variety to the museum’s admission quantities. Mombourquette reported visitation was down 95 for every cent final time and she’s worried about this time, much too.

The museum would not have any income for promoting, she reported, so it is relying on word of mouth.

“My hope in this article is that … most people that comes by means of in this article is blown absent and they’re likely out and conversing about it,” she reported.