| Show BUILDING ASSIOUT DAM The works at Assiout are under a talented engineer Mr G II Stephens who Is n born ruler Ho has 11000 men working night and day at his great dam and the huge wall and navigation canal which It This accompanies may seem when compared with Assouan a comparatively small affair for It 1 has to supply abundantly the great Ibra hlmieli canal which In Its course supplies sup-plies the ancient Bahr Yusuf and will vastly Increase the cultivable land on the margin of the Libyan desert But in many ways the Asslout weir is even more remarkable than a wall of granite founded on a rode I Is built on the bed of the Nile Itself Never once has rock been touched for the foundations Mr Wlllcocks has shown In his saving of the old Barrage that a permanent floor could be laid down on the riverbed river-bed which properly constructed would carry any weight of masonry fit to resist re-sist the pressure of any stream above It This system is practically the one used In the Asslout barrage The Asslout dam Is half a mile long and has a navigation lock on the westside west-side The river has been cofferdammed In sections and H masonry and concrete con-crete floor forty feet below the level of high Nile laid down as I foundation eightyseven feet wide by ten feet thick On this floor the superstructure is built At both up and down stream sides of this floor cast Iron sheet piles are driven down to 1 further depth of thirteen feet the joints o which are hermetically scaled by cement grout so that no percolations can get below the foundations The barrage has 111 openings 1 of about sixteen feet each which will be supplied with ordinary sluices The navigation canal lock will he fifty feet wide This last year C1S09 onefourth of the whole work was cone and the wages paid during June and July for Instance were floOO per day The outlay at the Assouan dam was even greater so that immense sums are spent among the natives of the country which the wOks are Intended to benefit I bene-fit permanently All the work done at both reservoirs was left safely above the highest water level till next season and at Asslout no more cofferdams will be needed There were 11500 men employed em-ployed at Asslout and S500 at Assoun when the wqrk had lo be stopped by the rising of the Nile The walls at both places are of stone and cement The blocks of stone were frequently so warm owing to the fierce sunshine owing in that tho mens hands were blistered lifting them and the heat of the place HIn June was ant degrees in the shade I But till has gone on with scarcely an I accident There were a dozen cases of I sunstroke but only a very few deaths t was remarked that those who drank I too much liquid of any kind wore must liable to ItcrAlnalccg Magazine j L S |
