Show TEXAS GOES DOWN ACCIDENT YESTERDAY IX THE BROOKLYX XtAVY YARD Stream of Water III Indies in Diameter S Diam-eter Rallied Into the Starboard Engine Room Seems to Be a Particularly Par-ticularly Unfortunate Vessel NEW YORK Nov 9The battleship Texas added Another to the list of her misfortunes this morning at the Cobb dock in the Brooklyn navy yard The yoke of the valve of her main starboard star-board injector gave way The water poured into the starboard engine room and the battleship went to the bottom There was less than 20 feet of water in the dock and the Texas draws about 24 feet so she did not go down far She rested easily on the soft east river mud with her water line four feet under the surface The Texas has been at the navy yard for a week undergoing slight repairs re-pairs The repairs included some minor changes in the starboard injector injec-tor and to make these the pipes connecting con-necting i with the condenser were disconnected dis-connected and the end covered with temporary plates S On Sunday afternoon Captain Glass made an inspection of the entire ship I He saw the injector with its valve and condenser pipes and they seemed to be all right The injector is the apparatus through which sea water is taken tnto the condenser I consists of a 13inch pipe running from the bottom of the ship to the starboard engine room engne where i ends in a bowl from which the pipes lead to the condensers I is furnished with a steel valve closing against a flange to keep the water out when it is not needed This valve is raised and lowered by a steel screw operated by a wheel and working in a yoke at the top of the bowl The yoke is of steel and weighs about 500 pounds The strain of water against the valve proved too much for the yoke at 615 this morning and i broke short off allowing the valve to rise and thus permitting the water to rush into the bowl The temporary caps over the pipes were blown off and the bonnet of the bowl was dislodged A stream of water 13 inches in diameter rushed into the starboard engine room Engineer Higgins was in the engine room when the yoke gave way and he ran up on the deck when he saw what a body of water was flowing in and how serious the accident was He gave the alarm and the steam whistle was blown the signal to close watertight bulkheads Then the gongs sounded the call to general quarters and the men came up on the run Captain Glass took personal command The order to close the bulkheads was obeyed by the men as though they had been at a drill and it was executed in two minutes and 20 seconds The water Continued to pour in until the starboard I engine compartment was completely flooded The longitudinal bulkhead dividing di-viding the engine rooms ha several small openings in i and the water leaked through and soon flooded the port engine room but the closing of the transverse bulkheads prevented i from reaching any other part of the ship When the Texas came t6 a stop on the bottom of the river her bow had sunk about five feet and the stern a little more Captain Glass reported to Commodore Com-modore Sicard the commandant of the navy yard and a report was at once forwarded to Secretary Herbert at Washington Then the work of raising the ship was begun Wrecking tugs sieamea aiongsiae ana a aiver was sent down in the starboard engine room to try to plug the injector and make i possible for the water to be pumped out Late in the afternoon the divers succeeded in fitting a plug into the end of the injector and then the pumps began 1 make an impression on the water in the engine room At 830 oclock the ship righted and soon after that was floated She was launched from the Norfolk navy yard on June 28 1892 and went into commission in the spring of 1895 I She has had many mishaps several of which have been of a more serious na ture than the present accident She has had more accidents than all the I put rest together of the North Atlantic squadron |