Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-07-24
Is THE EARTH A BOMB?
May We Be Blown Into Eternity BY a
Natural Gas Explosion?
Is the Seriptural Prophesy of Fiery Ordeal
for the Earth and It's People to
Come to Pass2
New York Herald Correspondence.

L. W. Thickstun of Metuehen, concern
ing the possibility of the upheaval of the
earth caused by natural gas explosion,
1 secured from Mr. Thickstun yesterday
an explanation of his ideas, which is as
startling as it is important.
Natural gas in Western Pennsyl-
vania, Eastern Ohio, and IN some other
parts of the country said he, lis one
Of the things the public is thinking about
with some degree OF apprehension. Cap
ital in large amounts has been invested in
its production or rather in its capture
and in its application as a heater and as
an illumination Millions OF dollars find
profitable employment in this manner all
over the extensive territory known as the
oil regions.
"In Pittsburg alone enough natural
gas is consumed dally to give sufficient
amount of light for the needs Of the
largest city iii the world. North of
Pittsburg 100 miles, at Erie, and all the
way between the two places, natural gas
is found in nearly every neighborhoCd
where proper tests have been made. in
all other directions from this busy and
prosperous manufacturing center gas has
been found i'll quantities apparently in
exhaustible.
"a reservoir of vast proportions, or
many reservoirs must have been provided
for by nature TO contain what gas has al
ready escaped from wells and what is yet
stored away in the bowels of the earth.
Extensive deposits have also been found
in the western counties of our own state,
as well as in Pennsylvania and Ohio. How
far the openings extend below the earth s
surface is not known, but the subterra-
mean cavern or caverns where gas abOunds
must be of great magnitude.
''Gas began TO appear in large quanti-
ties soon after the first wells on Oil creek
were finished Col. Drake drilled the
first well near Titusville, Pa, during the
summer of 1859, ana at depth OF sixty
nine feet he struck oil. That was a
pumping and not flowing well. From
it a. small amount of gas escaped, as is
the case with most pumping wells. Sub
sequently many other wells were opened,
thousands of them, soae pumping and
some flowing.
CAN flowing wells are gas as well as
oil wells. In flowing wells oil Is thrown
out by escaping gas. Big spouters' be-
gan to appear eight or ten miles below
Titusville, along the creek, early in
1860. Since then they have been opened
in hundreds of other localities from the
source to the mouth of the Allegheny
river and along many of its tributaries.
Among the most noted and the most
profitable of all flowing wells was the
Noble we'll, seven miles below Titusyille,
struck on May 8, 1868. It began as
1900 gallon well. II was q 'bOomer' of
the first order Gas and oil came from a
crevice in the sandrock, 40 feet below
the bed Of OIL creek. Twenty rods lower
down the stream was the Caldwell well.
1t was q good 700 barrel well. Oil was
reached in it at about the same depth as
the Noble well. By May 2S the produce
ton of the Noble well ran up to 1900 bar
rels and the Caldwell had fallen off to
400 barrels day. Before the middle of
June the latter was so nearly exhausted
that it flowed not more than seven or
eight barrels, and the former was pour
ing out q flood of 22OO barrels of petro-
leum every twenty-four hours.
''The Noble well did nobly, ran about
twenty-five months, produced over five
hundred thousand barrels of oil, an i'm
mense amount of gas-Wasted on Oil
creek air-and then it, too, was worth
less hole in the ground. Water fills the
place the gas and oil occupied and no
one fears danger from that quarter.
''Not very far from the Noble well
there is another kind of blower. This
has no water or oil in 1t, only gas, and
that comes out at such a rate that you
might hear it pulsating and fairly
pounding a mile or two away on still
summer evening. This, like other wells,
was sunk for oil, and this is the kind in
which danger turks. This well never
fills up with water and probably never
will. There are hundreds and thOus-
ands scattered all over the oil regions
just like it. We are anxious to know
what sort of place is under our coun-
try where this treacherous substance
comes from.
off the Noble well threw out 500 200
barrels Of oil and as much gas besides in
less than two years what are these purely
gas wells doing? What have they been
doing a score or more years? VIII some
one rise to his feet and explain?
"Thinking people are growing uneasy
about il. Where does the enormous pro-
duction come from anyway? Where is
the vast gas storehouse or stOrehouses To-
Gated? Do these subterranean reservoirs
fill up as rapidly as they are emptied?
Does our atmosphere rush in TO take the
places vacated, or is gas forming con-
stantly to keep the leaking tanks full?
VIII too much of our atmosphere move
from the outside to the inside of the earth
to the injury or extinction of animal and
vegetable life?
''Worst of all, viii the air mingle
with the gas under our feet, and thereby
enable it TO ignite and exploded If an
explosion comes will it blow up all the oil
regions from the great lakes to old Vir-
ginia, and viii the Allegheny mountains
stand between us aud all harm? Do
oceans of natural gas extend from III
tusville to the mountains and
from the mountains to New York,
and is il possible for these lakes-as I'M
manageable and as unsafe as dynamite
is it possible for them to be set on fire at
the same instant?
''Some of these heterogeneous may
seem absurd and not worth the ink it
takes to print them or the time it requires
to read them; but then, again. suppose
they are all pertinent? Suppose the last
one turns out TO be n fact as well as q
question, what then?
"Migbt not an explosion occur which
would be simply terrific? Instead of