The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-03-26

pdFliCuIdF section or the DllgeS was OH the starboard side of the extreme after part of the engine-room. Immediately aft Of the engine-room was the ships magazine, separated from the engine room by steel partition. Bilges are cleaned with turpentine- soaked waste. The bilge-cleaner, too lazy to fill one of the small turpentine cans provided for the purpose, dragged a five-gallon can Of turpentine to his bilge station and began work. Smoking is strictly prohibited in the engine-roomS of a man-of-War on account of the large amount of combustiEle stores necessa- rily slowed below This bilge-cleaner was a reckless sort of blade, however, and when he had got his bilge-clean- ing under way he took out his pipe and lit it. carelessly chucking the match in the bilge There was some turpentine in the bilge, and the match, still aglow, set it into Q flame. The bilge- cleaner jumped to his feet, and in doing so he overturned the five gallons of turpen- tine. Then the bilge was converted Into roaring mass of flame that shot to the berth-de gratings and played directly against the steel bulkhead separating the engine-room from the magazine. The careless blae-cleaner was scorched, and he bolted for the spar deck yelling like a madman. The second-class fireman with the head on him was the only other man in the after engine-room at the time this happened He made a jump for the bilge-covers that had been removed by his reckless mate, and, although se- verely burned while doing it, he thrust them over the bilges Then he seized wrench and knocked open ore of the intakes from the sea, letting water directly into the bilge that was in flames. The water came in so rapidly that 1t knocked the bilge- covers off, but it drowned the fire. There was more than foot of water in the en- gine-rooms before the intake could be closed again, but that was a small matter compared with what might have happened had the hot turpentine flame Tapped the magazine bulkhead much longer By the time fire quarters was sounded and the men on deck got down below the second-class fireman, with his hair and eyebrows all burned off and the skin peeling from his face and hands, was throwing bucketful af- ter bucketful of the incoming sea wa ter against the steel bulkhead, which was already so hot that it sent back clouds of steam.
 Spontaneous combustion in the coal bunkers of men war is something that has always to be guarded against. There is a good deal of coal dug out of the ground in many parts of the world that is practically perfect for steam making purposes, but it is not used by men-of-war on account of it's known liability to ignite of itself in hot coal bunkers abutting upon fire and boiler rooms In all men-of-war bunkers there is an apparatus that gives the alarm when the temperature of the bunkers rises above a certain set fig- ure. The bunkers are all numbered ] If the temperature of bunker No. 1, for 1 instance, rises beyond the set mark the alarm is given by means of ring ing registering machine placed just outside the slippers cabin. The ma rine orderly for the commanding off, i cer whose station outside the cabin door enables him to keep his eye on 1 and his ear attuned to the music of this bunker fire alarm, is always the man to make the rush to the officer of l the deck with the news that there is | something wrong in one of the bunkers. Then the ships bugler sounds fire quarters, and all hands gallop to their fire stations. Steam is turned into the bunker the coal in which is ignited, and the fire thus put out. Such fires are not at all uncommon, but accounts of them rarely get into print
 ''No coal-passer or any other mem- Der of the engineers gang is permitted to carry an open light into the bunk CTS, but the coal-passers often do this, all the same. Coal-bunkers on modern ships of war are all fitted with cou- pie of standing electric lights each, but in coaling ship the glass castings around these lights are generally smashed, for the most part leaving the bunkers unlighted. The coal-passers can't see to get out coal in bunkers as dark as midnight, and so they carry their open lights into the bunkers or ders or no orders.
 ''On one of the big cruisers of the Pa cific station a few years ago the bunk CT fire-alarm outside the shippers door set up steady ringing, and the ma rine orderly rushed forward with the announcement that there was fire in | coal-b bunker No. s. The ship was at sea at the time, but this coa1-bunker was as yet unbroached, or at least the chief engineer had not been informed
 as is required, that the coal-passers had started to haul coal out of that bunker. Clearly, then, in the minds ol the chief engineer and the officer of the
 deck there was spontaneous combus- tion in No. bunker, and a minute af-
 ter the alarm was given the fremer
 were at the bunker door with the
 steam hose They found the bunker
 door open, which the chief engineer
 couldn't understand, but they lei
 enough steam into the bunker to push
 the cruiser five knots before a steady
 bawling of sea explosives from within
 the bunker caused them to shut the
 steam hose off. Then the voice within
 was heard growing:
 "FWhat the bloomin' devil are youse
 flat-foot paint-scrubbers a-tryin' tc
 do? Drown me an choke me to death
 ye blasted'-- And the rest of it was
 simply a torrent of Jolly Roger talk.
 "The voice within the bunker be-
 longed to 8 coal-passer who, without
 the knowledge of the chief engineer
 had preached No. bunker because il
 was close to the fire-rooms and there
 fore easy to work. The coal-passel