Doctor Brownrigg was interested in the health of miners.  He wondered how the gases found down mines might affect them. He built a laboratory near Corporal pit.  Lead pipes brought fire damp (methane) straight from the mine into the lab. Brownrigg used furnaces to ignite the gas, to see if he could create a mini pit-explosion .  This was over a hundred years before the invention of the Bunsen burner.

As part of his experiments, William Brownrigg had been measuring the air pressure in the mine with a barometer.  He was the first person to notice that fatal explosions followed falls in air pressure.  Modern coal mines still use this technique to keep their workers safe.

Brownrigg was also Carlisle Speeding’s doctor.  He saw, and wrote about the effects that prolonged exposure to 'Fire Damp' had on his friend’s health.

Brownrigg could have become famous, but he hated traveling to London to present his findings to the Royal Society.  He preferred life with the miners in Cumbria.