New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-05-10
ANOTHER BLUNDER AT TIE DAM

The latest-prudence forbids us to say the
INSTRUMENTATION of laundering and consequent
delay on the new Croton Dam is one OF those
things which cause us to feel most keenly the
inadequacy of the English vocabulary as We
bicle of expression. There lies before us Il
stately folio volume, published many years ago
bv one of the most competent dam engineers OF
the age II describes with much scientific de-
tail and with a wealth of figures, formulas
diagrams and maps the elaborate preparations
made for the construction of this dam, the
painstaking examination Of the site, the borlnSs
and soundings to ascertain the quality of the
underlying rock. We have wildly in mind the
story of years of deliberate work in the great
gorge near Quaker Bridge, of cavernous exca-
vations into the depths of the earth, of almost
infinite painstaking to assure the absolute
soidity and everlasting security of this greatest
of all dams We remember when a huge dam
in Texas was swept away and other such
structures yielded to the pressure Of floods,
New York was invited to congratulate itself
upon the impossibility of any such catastrophe
ever happening on the Croton. Our dam was
to be as secure as the everlasting hills them
selves; and so as weary years dragged on, ana
the Aqueduct Commissioners continued to draw
fat salaries from the public purse, and the dam
grew slowly, very slowly, We were consoled TOT
all the expense and all the delay by the assur-
ance that when at last the dam was done II
would be done as perfectly and as durably as
human skill and scientific knowledge and in
finite taking of pains could make it.
Look on that picture and on this! To-day we
are informed that a large part of it was built
and is at this moment resting upon limestone
rock of the texture and strength and water re
sisting qualities of brown sugar! Hundreds OF
feet of the southern end Of the dam rest upon
such foundation Were the water turned into
the reservoir back of the DAM we were re-
Gently Informed il would be next fall, it would
sweep through that rotten base in a torrent ana
undermine the dam. and that end of the dam
would go down in utter wreck. How deep that
Iayer of disintegrated limestone extends has
NOT YET been ascertained. 1t has been sounded
10 a depth of forty-five feet without reaching
bottom OF course. il must all come out and
that mart of the dam must come down. Another
vast abyss must be dug into the earth and hlled
with masonry through years more OF delay ana
OF salary paying to the Aqueduct COMMISSION
ers After that what? Who knows where else
some equally serious fault may not be dis
closed? Who is prepared to-day to guarantee
the integrity of any part of the structures we
hope and try TO believe. that the great central
wall of masonry is absolutely secure But after
such a disclosure as this a robust faith is re-
quired for such belief. What claim has this
dam for exemption from the old rule of 'falsus
in uno, falsus in omnibus:
But this rock seemed and was supposed to be
all right when that part of the dam was built
That is no apology and no excuse. Were there
no engineers. no biologists. at hand who could
do something more than suppose? Such mat
tiers are capable of scientific demonstration. 1t
should have been known ten years ago just as
surely as IT is to-day that that limestone was I'M
ht for the dams foundation. Are We TO under