Combined materials, personnel and ventilation shaft serving the active Ruch Ziemowit section of KWK Piast-Ziemowit hard coal mine near Lędziny.
Szyb „Szewczyk" is a multi-function shaft serving the Ruch Ziemowit section of KWK Piast-Ziemowit, the major hard coal colliery based in Lędziny in the Upper Silesian coalfield. The shaft performs combined materials-transport, personnel-descent, and ventilation functions, as designated in the canonical name: materiałowo-zjazdowo-wentylacyjny. The winding engine serving szyb Szewczyk was commissioned in 1969, during a period when the Ziemowit colliery was undergoing rapid expansion.
The shaft is located in the village of Rachowy, in the area of Bieruń, within the wider mining concession of the Lędziny I mining field. In 2018 the telecommunications infrastructure running through szyb Szewczyk on Level II was subject to a major modernisation contract under PGG. KWK Ziemowit operated as an independent colliery from 3 December 1952 until 1 July 2016, when it was merged with KWK Piast to form KWK Piast-Ziemowit; szyb Szewczyk continues in active use within Ruch Ziemowit.
The origins of hard coal mining in the Lędziny area reach back to the nineteenth century, with organised excavation on the Piast workings from the 1840s. Construction of the colliery that would become Ziemowit was initiated under German occupation in 1940, when shaft-sinking began on 29 July 1940 for the ventilation shaft, and on 2 October 1942 for the main shaft. The project was associated with wartime plans for coal supply to industrial facilities including a planned synthetic fuel plant in the region.
During the occupation the mine under construction was known as Grube Günther, after the director of the princely Pless mining operations, Günther Falkenhahn. Following liberation in 1945 the name was changed to Ziemowit. The colliery was formally commissioned on 3 December 1952, producing hard coal from the Lędziny I concession area.
Szyb Szewczyk was sunk and equipped as part of the mine's expansion programme during the 1960s. The shaft winding engine was commissioned in 1969, a year in which the mine's records also show 23,851 metres of new roadway driven. The shaft serves as a combined materials, personnel, and ventilation shaft — handling downcast ventilation air, cage transport of workers, and movement of materials and equipment into and out of the workings.
By 1971 annual output had exceeded 3 million tonnes. In 1972, on 1 July, the Ziemowit colliery was merged with the neighbouring Piast colliery to form a single enterprise, creating what would become by 1979 the largest hard coal mine in the world, with output reaching approximately 30,000 tonnes per day from ten shafts across three independent sections. In 1978 the Polish cosmonaut Mirosław Hermaszewski descended in the mine, then known in the Lenin ruch, to what was then the deepest accessible point.
By 2006 output at Ziemowit stood at approximately 7 million tonnes per year with 4,228 employees recorded in early 2014. The colliery was transferred into Kompania Węglowa S.A. on 1 February 2003. From 1 May to 1 July 2016 it operated briefly as an independent unit within Polska Grupa Górnicza before being merged with KWK Piast on 1 July 2016 to form KWK Piast-Ziemowit.
Szyb Szewczyk continues in active use within Ruch Ziemowit. In 2018 the Level II telecommunications network in the shaft was fully upgraded under a PGG contract, involving installation of 3,650 metres of new cable and associated equipment from the shaft collar to the 463-metre level.