Port Royal standard and commercial. [volume] (Beaufort, S.C.) 1874-1876, 1876-02-17
POOLING WITH DYNAMITE.
Pounding 1t with tan Ak and Making Bon
fire Of 1t.

Pouuding tt with IAN Ak anu MnAihB Dun.
fire Of 1t.
Thirty thousand pounds OF dynamite
are stored in Lowell, a suburb OF St.
Louis. The magazine is a small, de-
tached, windowless house; and since
the Bremerhaven disaster, st. Louis
correspondent of the Sun writes,
this structure has been regarded with
apprehension by the residents OF the
neighborhood. Mr.. Julian, the agent
in charge, made public tests of the ex-
plosive intended to allay the excitement.
Dynamite or giant po wder is finely
powdered sile1, or infusorial earth,
saturated in three times its weight OF
nitro-elycerine. It was discovered
three years ago by Alfred Nobel, a
Swede, and, as generally made, resembles
damp Graham -four. 1t e1rlodes with a
force seven and ohe-hslf times greater
than the strongest blasting powder, and
in effectiveness is often quite equal to
nitro-glycerine itself. The generally
accepted idea OF the peril of handling it.,
so MIR. Julian says, is greatly e1agger-
ated. He claims that neither light nor
electricity, nor ordinary shoes can pos
sibly explode it. In all the speculations
concerning the Bremerhaven disaster,
and the statement that clockwork struck
the thirty-pound blow, none seem to
have doubted that such blow was sutti-
cient to have caused the explosion. Mr..
Julian's theory is that there was fulmi-
nate cap ready for explosion, and that q
Jar of the clockwork caused premature
blow.
In conducting the experiments Mr..
Julian entered the storehouse with q
lighted cigar in his mouth. The dyna-
mite was piled in fifty pound boxes, each
containing one hundred cylindrical rolls
of dynamite, every roll being about
eight inches long, and varying from
three quarters to an inch and one-half In
diameter. These rows, called cartridges,
were incased in heavy paper saturated
with Gnseed oil to preserve the contents
from moisture. The agent scared the
spectators by throwing one OF the boxes
out of the door. It struck forcibly on
the frozen ground. Thence it was taken
to the edge of cliff and dropped twenty
feet on rock. The box was shattered,
and the cartridges few around harmless
ly. The dynamite was then gathered In
a heap, and pounded by heavy blows
with an az. Next it was set on fire.
The fame caught, slowly at first, rapidly
afterwards, now on little projection,
then on round surface, until the whole
pile was burning with q fierce pink
fame and intense brilliancy, and such
great heat that no one could stand within
a dozen feet of it. For several minutes
it Kissed and glowed, and then subsided,
leaving a rock-ike residue, which speed
ily hardened to the similitude OF white
quartz. Though the Kissing was tre-
mendous, and the light and heat over,
powering, there was not the faintest
explosion. Frozen dynamite was sub
jected to the same tests. Next an at
tempt was made to fire stick OF frozen
dynamite with an ordinary miners fuse
and Illuminating cap. The cap exploded,
but the dynamite was only burst asunder
and was found couple OF feet away LII
an unchanged condition. Three ounces,
unfrozen, were then exploded in the
open air with fuse and Illuminating
cap. The concussion was very heavy.
The points claimedas demonstrated were
these That dynamite, as ordinarily
manufactured and sold in this country
and Europe, cannot be exploded by q
blow or shock; that when frozen it can.
not be exploded at all; that when burned
in the open air it is .as harmless as tai;
low dip; and that it is the safest OF al
the explodents.
Mr.. Julian says that there are only
two factories in the United States where
dynamite is made, and the largest is in
Drakeville, N. j., where more thar
three hundred tons year are prepared:
The silurious earth used is brought
from Germany, and it will absorb and re-
tain only about three times its own
weight of nitro-glycerine. When more
than this percentage is used it is apt to
leak out of the packages, and, collecting
in drops, becomes source OF great
danger. For this reason great care Is
used not to exceed the limit of seventy.
five per cent. Mr.. Julian also said thai
two thousand pounds of dynamite were
burned in q warehouse jersey City a
short time ago. There was no explosion,
although the fact of the storage OF the
stuff in O crowded city was doubtless
unknown To the authorities.