The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1900-01-05
A QUEER EXPLOSION.
HOW A MOUNTAIN LOCOMOTIVE
CAME TO AN UNTlMElY END.

Vnere was neither Fire I'm Her Fur
mace No~ Water In Her Boiler, ana
Yet She Managed to Blow Up In the
Most Approved Style.
Mr.. Henry Alquist, prominent rail-
road man, relates the story of a curl
Gus wreck, the facts in which he will
vouch for.
''It is such a remarkable thing" said
| Mr.. AlQuist to a reporter, that | fear
! many will be inclined to brand it as
| pipe l have been railrOading now
for over 20 years, and never in all my
| varied experience have | seen such a
unique and complete wreck as the one
I speak of-that Of engine 1929 of the
Rio Grande Western. Railroad men
will tell you that locomotives seldom
| explode nowadays, but 1.129 did and
in very peculiar way.
Sat the time this wreck occurred
was holding down the job of train dis
patcher at Soldier Summit, Utah, and
tough old job it was. Never been
there, l suppose? Well. Soldier Sum-
NIT is a station on the top of one of
the Wasatch divides, a bleak and lone
ly place, where the Rio Grande West
ern has a roundhouse and coal chute
located. At the summit are long
snowsheds covering the tracks. These
sheds protect the line from the win
ter And it is only due to this method
that train ever gets over the noun
tain.
con both sides Of the mountain the
line winds down in a succession of
winding curves to lessen the grade.
Running off from the railway are
grade, run up into the hills and grad
ually come to dead level. These
switchbacks, as they are called. are SO
constructed that they can be thrown
from any point on the grade. And if
a train breaks in two while ascending
the steep grade the runaway cars can
be switched on to one Of these spurs,
where the breakaway finally stops aft
er it has run up the spur as far as the
momentum attained in it's descent will
take it.
Gail heavy trains have an extra To-
connective before the grade is tackled.
These are called helper engines and
are kept in roundhouses at each side
of the mountain with steam up.
"One night l got word from Clear
Creek, a town in the western valley,
that the 9:20 freight would be 30 min
utes late on account Of having to pull
out a crippled engine. 1920 She had
burned out her fues and had to be
hauled to Grand Junction for repairs.
"That night about 10 o'clock, after l
had passed down the Salt Lake ex-
press, heard the freight coughing up
the long grade from Clear Creek. There
was a snowstorm raging, and the wind
hOwled around the station like the
mischief When the overdue 900 pull
ed into the shelter of the big snow
sheds on the wind swept summit, the
first thing asked was, Where's the
dead engine?
Behind the doghousev shouted the
con- But as I held my lamp above
my head I failed to see it. l was just
about to call his attention to it when.
during lull in the storm. we plainly
heard the familiar rattle of the rails
as the runaway engine flew at light
ming speed down the mountain. No.
1929 had broken loose and was tear
ing down the grade to destruction.
II jumped and pulled the lever which
opened the spur switches. This l
knew would prevent smashup, as the
engine would run up on the switchback
and come to a stop. But l was too
late. Almost at the same instant I
threw the lever terrific explosion was
heard from far down the mountain.
The runaway had exploded"
81 thought you said moment ago,
Mr.. Alquist." interrupted The Scimi-
tar man, that the locomotive was
dead one?' If she had no fire under
her boiler, how could she explode?
''That was the only thing couldn't
understand myself" the railroad man
replied. Il could easily see how the
dead engine could break loose on that
grade and l could understand not
hearing it's descent during such a
bowling blizzard. but the explosion
foored me. The only theory which in
any way solved the mystery was that
the old kettle was blown up by COM
pressed air.
'You See. when the engine broke
loose from the freight and started
down the mountain the pistons in the
cylinders began to act as air COM 1
pressors During the rough trip up
her throttle probably Jared open, and
as the speed increased with every rev.
o1ution of her drivers her boiler soon
filled with compressed air. 1t was not
long before those flying pistons had
worked up a pressure of nearly 500
pounds to the square inch, which came
in faster than it could escape by the
safety valve. and before the old ma
chine reached Clear Creek her boiler
let go."-Memphis Scimitar.