White Pine news weekly mining review. [volume] (East Ely, Nev.) 1910-1920, 1913-09-28

1.Ir - EN ~ aIu Il
nall or three years.
on a recent occasion the write,
had the privilege accorded him hy
the Constitutionalist leaders of y,s,,
iue d point in the State OF Coahuila
"here track and bridge destruction
was In full progress. and a most n
1erestlng sight 1t was. He was also
permitted to carry a camera and taxi
views OF the work of ruin. some of
"hich are given herewith. Up to the
past six months track destruction had
oeen accomplished either by the use
Oh a Wfecking crane, which lifts sec
eiohs OF rails and ties bodily and nil
ed them up ready for burning. or by
the slower process of the ella VIII
wrench and pick. But a constitu-
tionalist expert devised a new sys-
TEN.
A trench is dug between two ties.
through which a heavy chain is pass
ed around " opposite rails and
made fast in the center of he track
10 thls n end of a heavy steel ca
Bile Is hooked, the other end being
made fast to the coupling on the en-
slhe pilot, At the signal the engi-
neer starts his locomotive slowly
backward, and as they are huge go
ton consultations with 22-inch
by SO-ineh cylinders, one can readily
imagine that something has to give
And 1t does The rails are torn lose
from the spikes that hold them to
the ties and are dragged closely to-
gether in the center of the roadbed.
The ties are loosened from the bal
last and dragged into piles, while in
many cases the rails are badly bent
and twisted by the force applied. A
gang of men follows the engine, pill
ing ties on top of the rails and leay-
ing others beneath them. These are
then saturated with oil and a match
applied. In a short time the ties are
consumed and the rails left lying on
the ground twisted and contorted
into all sorts of shapes, and of no
further use until they have been re-
rolled.
An interesting feature TO railroad
men was noted in connection with
the resistance offered by the fish and
tie plates TO the work of destruction.
Where the old fashioned fish plate
was used, a single pull often destroys
from two to three kilometers of
track before any resistance sufficient
10 break the chain is encountered. In
this way as high as twenty kilome-
ters of track have been turned up
and burned in a single day. But
where the Goldie tie plates are used,
as was the case with the track the
writer saw destroyed. not more than
one hundred to two hundred feet
could be torn up at a time. the chain
usually breaking in less than that
distance owing to the immensely SUI
perior resisting quality of the tie-plate
named. No better test of the COM
paratiye merits of the two methods
of rail connection could be devised.
The rails on this portion of the track
were IS pounds in weight and are
stamped Carnegie"
The destruction of wooden bridges,
of which hundreds have been ruined.
is of course easy. They are simply
saturated with oil and burned. With
the steel bridges, however, ii is DIFF
trent. These are destroyed by drill
ing holes into the piers and abut-
ments close to the bridge seats, as
also rows of holes horizontally along
the bottoms of the piers where they
can be reached. according to the state
of the water In the stream. These
holes are charged with dynamite, the
fuses are connected with a battery
of the type used in the coal mines IN
this region, and when the opportune
mement arrives the electric current
Is turned on and the bridge is usual
IL bretty effectually ruined. A truss
bridge at Obeyos. Coahuila, on the
line of the old Mexican International
RAILWAY. was destroyed while
the writer was at the place. This
vas merely displaced with dynamite
and the woodwork burned me
solid steel bridge, five spans owe
the Hermanas River, was destroyed
, few DAYS before the Obeyos bridge
~, II Is so far within the enemy 5
limos that no photo is available. The
solid stone piers and aeut-
ments were completely destroyed ae-
eording to eye-witnesses' leaving the
gIrding bent and twisted at