Goldsboro weekly argus. [volume] (Goldsboro, N.C.) 1885-1909, 1901-08-29
BROOKLYN BRIDGE MIsHAPs
Buck1ing Detected In Orders In
1895 Due to Sagging of Cables.

Buck1ing Detected In Orders In
1898 Due to Sagging of Cables.
The breaking of the Brooklyn bridge
supports the other day recalls the panic
On the bridge on May 80, 1888, a few
days after it was. opened, in which 10
persons were crushed or trampled to
death and scores were injured.
What caused the panic was never &C
curately known, says the New York
Herald. It was said that a child had
been pushed down the steps leading to
the Manhattan end of the footpath by
a gang of ~pickpockets who wished to
divert attention from their operations.
There was a crowd of pedestrians on
the bridge at the time, and a blockade
had formed in the footpath above the
two short flights Of steps, which are
only II inches wide and Z inches high.
Over the first to fall fell another and
another, and before any n realized
what was taking place the panic
spread. Everybody on the footpath,
imagining that the bridge was about to
fall, rushed down the western slope for
the New York side. At the steps men,
women and children were heaped in a
struggling mass, over which the crowd
behind sought to pass, trampling on the
PROSTATE bodies.
AS soon as possible the rush was
checked and the bodies of the living
separated from the dead. 1t was found
that 46 persons had been seriously
hurt. This was the worst accident that
has taken place since the great bridge
was opened for use, but there have
been hundreds Of minor accidents,
chiefly caused by the breaking Of the
cables which are used to pull the cars
across or by runaway horses.
Fears were expressed in August, 1898,
that the bridge was becoming over
crowded to the danger point. It was
then detected hat little sections Of
metal under the south middle cable Of
the bridge, about $50 feet from the
Manhattan tower, had undergone what
is known as "buckling." Members Of
the staff of bridge engineers said at
hat time that there was not the re-
hottest chance that the cables would
give way. The cables, they said, were
not the bridge. In outline they were
the very reverse of it. They drew at
tention to the fact that the cables be-
tween the towers are curve convex to
the river, while the bridge is a curve
convex to the sky.
AS the second Of these curves must
be a broad surface or roadway to carry
the crossing tramc and as this road
way has to derive its support from the
cables through intermediary guys OF
stays and ~suspenders, the coeficient Of
safety for these s~uspenders was in
opoo God fo 0vo that i1 fho -o-&i1oI
and the slanting wire ropes which con-
meet the cables and the bridge structure
were calculated to sustain seven times
the usual load.
The bridge structure, swinging from
the o. cables, would naturally have
a tendency to sway from side to side
or to rock as a man would in a ham
mock. To prevent this and other posi-
BILE defects the sengineers trazersed the
entire length of the bridge with six up
right or rigid fences, so to speak, the
stiffness and height of which should
tend to keep the structure in constant
repose. Fol- such a fence the technical
name is a truss. The six truss systems
of the bridge are tied at their feet by
immense longitudinal Orders of iron,
each girder between the towers being
an unbroken length Of metal
"Buckling" takes place in these GRID
ers n is occasioned by the fact that,
with the great sagging Of the cables in
midsummer and the sWaying motion
occasioned by the Uneven distribution
of the loading, the upturned curve of
the bridge structure tends to fatten
and to occupy a shorter distance from
end to end. AS a consequence the
Orders underneath become too long for
the new length of the depressed bridge
and try to rectify their excess Of length
by warping or curving out of a straight
line, forming sometimes a letter S on
its side. This ma1formation is called a
"buckle,"