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Show OUT TO SAVE LIFE Wrecking Train Important Part of Railroad Operations. Made Necessary by the Unavoidable Accidents Due to Storm and Flood Over the Vast Area the Rails Spread. Wrecking trains are located on every ev-ery division of important railroads, standing idle in the yard, waiting for calamity. A crane-car, with sufficient power to lift a freight car as a child lifts a toy; a supply car, containing rope, cables, chains, jacks, crowbars, tools, lanterns, fire apparatus, dynamite, dyna-mite, rails, ties; a caboose for the wrecking crew. When the word comes over the wire that the express and the fast freight have tried to see which could butt the other off the track, the wrecking crew assembles in a hurry. They are picked pick-ed men these minute men of the rails each with his specialty. Mechanics, track men, men skilled In explosives, strong men, slender men, at least one small but muscular man, they come from roundhouse and shop, freight yard and office, at the supreme call. The wrecking boss takes command, the best engine available backs down, and with a clear track the wrecking train gets to the disaster, often ahead of the special containing doctors and nurses. There is only one order to be obeyed wiien the wrecking crew gets in action "Save life." But once the victims are extricated and they are taken out in a remarkably short time the order changes. It is not, as might be expected, "Save property." It Is "clear the lines." It makes no difference that five jumbled freight cars contain expensive ex-pensive automobiles, or pianos, or phonographs, or fruit, which might be saved by careful work. If the contents con-tents cannot be saved in less than an hour, there is only one thing to do. The big steam crane is backed down to the mess, it long, tentacle-like hook descends, chains and ropes are brought into play, and slowly, surely, almost daintily, the crane swings the wrecked freight car and its contents to one side. Sometimes the easiest way to clear the lines is to burn the wreck or blow it up. Track can be quickly relaid, if damaged, but nothing can replace lost time. The price of a cargo of automobiles auto-mobiles is nothing against a five-hour delay. For the price of delay mounts in stunning geometrical progression. A few hundred dollars for the first hour, it may be many thousands of dollars In the second or third hour. A stoppage stop-page of the lines may mean a stoppage of the whole railway system, with hundreds hun-dreds of thousands of dollars worth of f-eight. Popular Mechanics Magazine. |
