The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1905-08-12
NEGLIGENCE CAUSED
THE DISASTER
ALLEGED STATEMENT OF NAVAL
ENGINEER REGARDING THE AC-
CIDENT ON THE BENNINGTON.

SAN DIEGO, August 3.-The Trib-
une this evening prints the follow
ing interview with an engineering Of
ficer of the flagship Chicago regard
ing the Bennington disaster: after
the Chicago reached port last Thurs
day morning 1 was one of the party
which boarded the Bennington and
made a thorough examination of the
Benningtons boilers" said the officer
what l saw in the Bennington en-
gine-room that day will bear out the
truth of my statement The whole
accident is due to the negligence Of
some one, / know who, but am not,
of course, free to tell who is to blame.
Had the accident not happened when
it did there is no doubt it would come
later,
MY examination of the boiler DEM
onstrdted to me conclusively that at
the time of the accident there was
not enough circulating water over
the crownsheet. The boiler is what
is known as locomotive boiler
The circulating water is over the top
of the crownsheet. At the time of
the accident this water had been al
lowed to run low. This left nothing
but the steam above the top of the
crownsheet, and as a result the top
of the sheet was soon red hot. Later
it became white hot. This of course
weakened the crownsheet and with
the tremendous amount of steam
pressure above caused it to collapse.
How the circulating water was al
lowed to run so low, of course, 1 do
not know. However, l do not believe
that any attention was paid to the
water gauge. Another thing, from
what I have seen neither the water
gauge, the steam gauge nor the
safety valve were in proper condition.
The safety valve on that boiler would
not have popped off under 500 pounds
pressure. This is shown by the con-
dition of the valve. The seat of the
valve is corroded in such a manner
that it shows conclusively that it had
not been popped off for at least a year
and very possibly eighteen months.
You must know that the action of
the steam causes a corrosion to form
at the seat of the safety valve. This
corrosion is not exactly a rust, and
yet it's effect is not entirely unlike
rust 1t is sticky and unless cleaned
out will soon cause the valve to stick
in such a manner that 500 pounds Of
steam could not set it off. Neither
was the valve properly Weighted. If
it had been when the pressure had
passed the danger point the whole
valve would have been blown out.
Ia I
The regulations require that every
safety valve must be blown at least
once every three months. Had the
valve been popped within the last
three months the steam would have
leaned out all the corrosiOn.
81 am very certain that the steam
gauge did not register correctly. Had
it done so there would not have been
such a tremendous pressure of steam
at the time of the accident. When
that crownsheet collapsed the boiler
was carrying pressure of between
$50 and 400 pounds"
The naval court of inquiry continues
its daily sessions on board the flagship
Chicago under circumstances which
battle newspaper correspondents. 1t
can be said that testimony is still
being heard by he board and that no
formal report has been made to the
Admiral, but no information as to the
probable length of the inquiry is avail
able. The only hint as to how long
the board may remain i'm session is a
statement made by Admiral Goodrich
to the effect that he did not think it
would take it long to reach a conclu-
sion, though the investigation would
be thorough.
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is correspondingly degraded. But IN
these times no individual is permitted