WORKING UNDER DIFFICULT CONDITIONS. A marine wrecking derrick picking up Pullman sleeping cars from a river bed. How Railway Wreckers Work By Herbert Lawrence Stone Na railroad wreck, the cost of the disaster is not confined to the actual damage to rolling stock which occurs at the time of the accident. Aside from possible sacrifice of life, often the greatest loss is occasioned by the tying up of traffic after the event. "Hurry" is not a word that sounds well in the mouth of a railroad man, but it is nevertheless, one of the most important words in his vocabulary, whether he ever speaks it or not. And never is its application as a goad to strenuous effort better illustrated than when it becomes necessary to open the road speedily after a wreck. While the railroads of this country have made wonderful advances in the safeguarding of trains, and while the percentage of accidents to the number of trains run is less, yet with the enormous increase in the volume of business the actual number of wrecks does not diminish. With the growth in the size of locomotives and cars, the operating men have had to revolutionize the methods of handling them when off the track. The old handderrick built on a flat car which could perhaps, lift one end of a fifteen- or twenty-ton freight car, so that a pair of trucks could be slipped under it, was useless when it came to moving a locomotive weighing 160 tons on its side in a ditch or at the bottom of a "fill." Not only was it necessary to get something that could handle. these heavy weights, but additional speed had also to be gained. With the amount of traffic now hauled on any large system, a delay of a day in clearing a wreck, would mean a freight blockade that would take a week to straighten out, to say nothing of the passengers held up by the delay. So steam was resorted to, and the evolution of the hand derrick has produced the steam crane, which is now the chief part of every modern wrecking outfit. These cranes are built with lifting capacities up to 100 tons, or more, and are placed on especially patterned steel cars. These cars have arms or outriggers underneath which slide out from sockets and can be blocked up from the ground on either side so as to give an absolutely firm base, enabling the crane to lift its full capacity no matter at what angle the A MODERN 150-TON STEAM WRECKING-CRANE AND CREW. The engine and base of the crane rest on the same bed-piece, the weight of the engine acting as a counter-balance to the weight of the jib, the whole swinging on a pivot to give a wide radius of action. The crew required to operate these cranes consists only of an engineer to work the engine, and a cranemanexclusive, of course, of the wrecking master and laborers to handle the wreckage. On arriving at a wreck the first consideration of the wrecking crew, if there are no injured to be looked out for, is to clear the road so that the rails may be relaid and the stagnant traffic sent on its way again. To do this properly is often a matter that requires considerable judgment, not only as to the manner in which it shall be done, but also as to what of the equipment it is desirable to save and what is worthless and can be pushed This photograph shows the difficulty of handling loaded box cars when broken up. jib, or boom, may be, or in what position it may be swung. Indeed the capacity of the cranes is only limited by the power of the engines operating them. It is on record that a crane with a rating of only 60 tons lifted unaided an entire locomotive, weighing 100 tons, from the bottom of a river and set it on the track again. aside to be burned. When locomotives are worth upwards of $20,000, and Pullmans $18,000 or more, or where there is a lot of valuable freight concerned, it is a delicate question to decide what is worth an hour or so to save and what must be sacrificed ruthlessly for the sake of speed in clearing a track. When the cars of the wrecked train that have not left the track have been ⚫ pulled away, a steam crane is pushed up to the wreckage where it hooks on to the nearest damaged car, around which chains have been slung, lifts it clear, load and all, swings it into position over the track-or the adjoining track, if there is more than one-so that new trucks from the wrecking train may be slipped under it and it can be drawn clear, ready to be run back to the nearest point at which it can be permanently repaired. The rapidity with which this can be done is remarkable, fifteen or twenty minutes to a freight car being not an unusual speed where there is not much wreckage on top of it. HEAVY WRECKING JOB COMPLETED. Both these wrecked locomotives were returned to the track four hours and fifteen minutes after collision. THE TECHNICAL WORLD MAGAZINE the shops for rebuilding and repairing, as formerly nearly all of the damaged cars were merely dragged into the ditch on one side of the track and burned. When it comes to tackling one of the modern locomotives the task is only more difficult in that it requires greater care and a thorough knowledge of how to go about it. These cranes are equipped with two blocks and lifting hooks, a small one at the extreme end of the jib for handling moderate loads, and a large one some four feet inside of the other for lifting the maximum weight, the falls working over separate drums. When a wrecked locomotive is in bad shape and some distance from the track, as often happens, a 100 ton crane makes nothing of rolling it up the bank to the track and setting it upright, when, hooking on to it with the large block and cable, the crane swings first one end back into place on the rails and then the other. tive is an extremely heavy one weighing When the locomo150 tons or so, and two cranes are available, they are pushed down into the wreckage, one from either side and fac ing each other, until they can reach the engine. Working together, they drag the locomotive by main force into a position where they can hook on to either end and then, lifting it bodily between them, swing it back over the rail, where new wheels are run under it, if necessary, and it is lowered upon them. formerly occupied, which was often a It is interesting to compare the time matter of days, with some of the records asters. On a single track road there ocmade recently in clearing up after discurred, a short time ago, a bad head-on collision between freight train, both running at a high rate of speed. It was a particularly ugly a passenger and a wreck, both locomotives being demolthem, while three men were killed and a ished and the wreckage piled high above fourth pinned under one of the engines arrived, and the crew got to work and, in the morning when the wrecking train with both legs crushed. It was 7 o'clock tricating the injured man, the track in spite of the time spent in was cleared, both engines had been pulled ex. ONE CRANE HAULING A BIG ENGINE UP AN EMBANKMENT. |