Year: 1872

Cold Weather and Railroad Aecidents.


The question whether iron and steel are made
more brittle by extreme cold comes up anew
every winter. The popular belief that they are
SO affected is confirmed by the fact that every
period of very severe cod is sure TO bring one
or more serious railroad disasters from broken
rails, wheels, or machinery. Newspaper read
ers do not need to be reminded that the cold
snap OF the present week is no exception to the
general rule. The disaster on the Titusville
railroad was one of the most frightful that ever
occurred, lacking no element of horror, and the
minor casualties in Indiana and Kansas were
startling and terrible enough 10 deserve special
attention If their terrots had not been eclipsed
by the more appalling calamity. II is easy and
natural to condemn the railroad management
which makes such things possible, and 10 fame
out in a burst OF fierce, but vague and soon
spent indignation, which would certainly be ap-
proprate and useful if properly directed and
sustained until it compelled reform where re-
form is needed.


The news columns Of the papers for the past
day or two have been full of varied horrors.
Besides the railroad disasters, there have been
fires, many of them attended by peculiarly dis
tressing incidents, the fall of Il church, full of
people, in Pennsylvania, and of public hall in
England, killing and manning many persons,
shipwrecks attended with suffering and loss oil
life, destruction of steamboats, in the Mississippi
and disastrous snow storms in the Rocky noun.
tains. The influence of the storm and severe cold
in causing most of these calamities is obvious
enough; but whether there is any such connec-
tion between intense cold and breaking rails or
car wheels is question not yet settled. Some
journals assume that the popular belief in the
increased liability Of iron to fracture in severe
weather is correct, and urge the need of ad-
ditional precautions at. such times to detect
breaEages before harm comes of them. An
other paper, discussing the same subject, says
that it is asceriained that the strength of good
iron and steel is increased by cold, and therefore
the excuse generally offered for the railroad dis
asters, which always occur during term of ex-
treme cold, is not valid.


question of such practical importance as
this ought 10 have been settled long ago by con-
elusive experiments. Reports of experiments
made by English engineers with view to deter
mine the strength of iron at varying tempera-





results Obtained did not confirm the prevailing
opinion, but they were Of little value in regard
to railroad operations in this country, because
none Of the experiments were made at lower
temperature than ten degrees below the freezing
point. A rail at that temperature might
show no loss Of strength, and yet become as
brittle as a pipe stem at forty degrees
lower, point 10 which the mercury sinks every
winter III many Of the northern states. We
have seen this winter a brief statement, pur-
porting TO be made on the authority of French
mechanical engineer, that experiments conduct
ed by him tended to prove that good iron was
rather strengthened than made weak by cold,
while poor iron was differently affected, but the
character Of his experiments, and the tempera.
lures at which they were made, were not gwen,
There ought to be no longer any doubt upon q
matter of SO much consequence, which any oil
our railroad engineers or mechanics could de-
termine by course of easy experiments,