I worked there and watch the last slab go thru the mill. A part of the Ohio Valleys real heart.

My dad worked here. He came home and said get your butt over to the mill and get a job. That was in 1973. I worked 30 years in this mill. Retired at 48 and got another job in a steel mill for till i retired again at 65. In all that time i was only laid off once. I worked hundreds of doubles and made good money. On the other side ofthat wall was a giant twin tandem reversing steam engine that drove the rougher mill. Hard to believe its all gone!

My uncle was a chemist at this plant. Its a shame of what has happened to the steel industry in this country! China and other foreign companies would like to thank you very much for having them buying up U.S. plants just to close them down. Oh, and let us not forget U.S. companies ,as well, for relocating or letting this happen in the first place.

I also was a motor Inspector in a blooming mill and bar mill, serviced the soaking pit cranes, mill cranes and slab yard plus all the electrical equipment associated with the area. The plant that I work at also had a Allis Chambers 36" steam powered mill rated at 3000 hp and a General Electric twin drive 44" electrical powered mill rate at 8000 hp with short loads to 10,000 hp. Funny my father-in-Law was a Soaking Pit Crane Operator.

My late father-in-law worked there for 32 years. He was a motor inspector on those pit cranes- heard many a tale out of there! My dad and a couple of his friends tried to get me in there as a scarfer (last job pictured). It fell through, and took my last shot at the mill with it. Went to the pottery for a few years, now I'm a truck driver.

I have to re-watch this every once in a while just to realize how massive things used to be and to see the steam engines running like swiss watches. No steam spewing there: all going to making power.

Wow! Absolutely amazing. I hope there is more like this for viewing. Thanks for sharing.

in the summer of 1990 i worked in the blooming mill. I was bumped up to production line as tally man, learned the turn around and shearman only to get as much overtime as possible, I was putting myself through college. I was the only college kid on production. I enjoyed the blooming mill. In the morning go to the office shanty pick up coffee, copies of morning paper crossword puzzles and cryptoquips. It was a lot of fun.

I was a boiler operator for many years in the boiler house next door that supplied steam to the blooming mill.

I worked at Weirton Steel for 32 years 8 months. Worked almost 20 years on the Soaking Pits. I mostly ran the cover crane, thats the one that opened and moved the covers. Took a bid to the Tin Mill Dept my last 12+ years when they decided to close the Blooming Mill.

Old connors Steel, now Steel of West Virginia had this exact Blooming mill set up.

My mom, dad, grand parent, uncle, step mom and my Husband used to work there... it a shame that it'll all be gone soon.

Most of my family worked in the mills in Weirton when I was a kid up into the late 70's, As an adult I always wanted to sneak in and roam around in them before they got torn down. Perhaps just pick up a scrap or two of metal. But too late, its all gone now....and its not coming back, ever So look forward now....

I spent a month as a sales trainee at Northwestern Steel & Wire in the blooming mill recording temperatures of the ingots coming out of the reheat furnace/soaking pit. In the cold Illinois winter

Grew up across the street from this.

Wow. They sure don't do it that way anymore. Very interesting to see all these parts to the process. Great shots of the different jobs.

Nasty looking job, but, I wonder how many people would kill to have the wages he made!

My father was a leverman in the Blooming Mill. He retired out of there.

From the blooming mill to scarfer and to a crop shear I did all of those jobs including hand scarfing though out a 45 year career in two different steel mills

I was a soaking pit crane operator from 1970 till 1980 . USS Ensley works , ALABAMA

Holy Crap how did they make money before automation and PLC's. Very interesting video.

Nice look back, sadly it seems another section of the Weirton Steel Mill is being torn down. The town is slowly destroying it's most iconic buildings because they think it's an eyesore.

Steel mills = a Healthy America... very sad.....

Thanks. Nice shot of the Heat Soaking Pit. My SLI&S steelmill burned down in house fire last year. I had a "Blooming Mlll. If I ever rebuild. I'll incorporsated this into the building.. When was this taken?

It is a trip when one of those explode. I was crossing the bridge going over where the ingot was traveling when one popped. Thought I shit myself.

I have a question do the molds and kettles have to be made at a higher tolerance to withstand the heat of the molten steel?

Great!

Alliance Machine soaking pit crane? Or Morgan Engineering?

wow soaking pits everything continuous cast now. My father in law was head rolled slab mill. Plant I worked in had a 44in blooming mill. Plant shutdown got job stripping overheads all resalable machinery. Was strange dismantling place once worked in. Cut up rolls half with oxygen lance that drop crack them half big rolls 44in mill. That hot scarfer cool men used to scarf billets I used wear leather chaps. Funny or Ironic we put it all in barges sent it to Tokyo 56,000 ton order 3 blast furnaces 2 coke plants a B.O.F. blooming mill 4 rolling mills was fun cutting it up. It was first to shutdown then all the rest followed. This river used have blast furnaces steel mills all down it. Like a dream now went to south works cut up locomotives. Gary works coke plant tube works blast furnace broke bones Gary works one rotten old place. Rust bad did not compensate or realize how deteriorated the steel structure was. So many years ago been in mills after blast furnaces mostly. l Last steel job processed steel bars that even shut down. The first mill most machinery sold stripped over head cranes motors drives switch gear place was fully functional when shut down was working cradle on shear biggest bar mill. Cut that shear in half to get it out there. Cut out all transformer loaded on rail cars to be buried in desert. 4 generations in steel industry. Look video of this think back it was all like a bad movie

How many remaining active steel mills do we have in the U.S today?

I was a pit crane man for 22 yrs at republic steel in Youngstown Ohio Then it became the LIKES CORP. It was closed by the clean air act FED AND STATE GOVERNMENT ORDER

my uncle's worked at that steel plant

How are the pinchers on the crane able to lift those massive blocks of glowing steel without any slippage? Wicked hot , looks like the devil's workshop. 🤔🏗♨️

So a bloom is an ingot that is rolled into the shape of like a piece of Wrigley's gum basically?

When is this from? Early 90s?

Back before we were dependent on China who’s pretty much raised all the prices to the point we could have been doing it here. Who knew that’s how it would work?

what year was this?

Because the products are called Blooms.

My hope is the standards are addheard to for quality sake especially with the I-beams No cutting corners allowed..

I used to drive a skid loader......so I know how to move levers like that.

Worked there from 2000-2003 (ISG Takeover). All gone now. Furnaces and BOP are next......

What keeps the slabs from melting together?

!!! que tiempos. Aquellos. $$$$ .. Ronald Reagan y Milton freidman ., hicieron grande a EEUU, 😂😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣😜😜🤘🤘🤘

Why do they call them Blooming Mill?

When America had jobs.

NE KADAR ZOR İŞ

Owners had either cut the cleanup staff or else no-one cared about working in filthy conditions and couldn't be bothered to use a brush and rags?

Why didn't they get refinancing for the Equipment .. From the Small Business Administration.. That is what I thought Small Business Loans was for things like this old equipment getting new equipment......

This is what American industrial might use to look like. Before people became too soft and cheap.

TOM PIPPS .FOAM - BATON ROUGE LOUISIANA USA . HI HELLO . I LINK YOU WORK .

Sad to watch this.

Yeah. It was the union that killed this place. I lived in Weirton for 40+ years. Most workers wanted to live upper-class on what in reality were middle-class jobs.

Weirton steel is mostly a scrap heap now. They don't make steel they roll out slabs and still operate the largest tin mill in the world. They just had a hiring boom. They wanted to hire 30 people. Around a 130 was interviewed and literally no one pasted the drug test. It's sad they thought that mill would go forever and never let any other business come in, now they don't have anything. If you go a little south of Weirton to Follansbee WV you find Wheeling Nissan steel mill and it's still doing good. Alot of people say it was the union that kill this mill. They went employee owned in 74 and it was a down hill slide ever sense.

video game

Was this Video made before the first World War?