Aug. 1, 1884.] 



♦ KNO\A^LEDGE ♦ 



85 



own destruction, together with that of those persons 

 being transferred from place to place. In the early days 

 of railway travelling, when trains were few and far 

 between, and when the pace was generally slower, the old- 

 fashioned hand-brake applied by the guards to their own 

 carriages were just good enough to be tolerated, but at the 

 present day, when so many improved forms are on the 

 market, it can only be regarded as little short of a crime 

 to despatch a train upon its perilous journey bereft of 

 what should be, in reality, its greatest safeguard. It 

 requires but little argument to demonstrate that a brake, 

 capable of being applied to only one or two carriages in a 

 more or less lengthy train, may, at times, prove even worse 

 than useless, for it begets in the minds of those in charge 

 a false sense of security. And what I have just said may 

 be even more strongly emphasized when we consider the 

 condition of a train supplied witli a continuous brake 

 which can only be of use when every portion of it is in 

 good order. That the recent catastrophe at Penistone 

 may be ascribed to a state of things not far removed from 

 the one depicted is, I fear, only too probable. Of this, 

 however, I shall be at liberty to speak more fully later on. 

 Suffice it for the present to say that in this particular case 

 the engine was not )iulled up by the brake, but went on 

 for 570 yards from the spot where the axle of the engine 

 broke, while the carriages from which it parted company 

 only proceeded about half the distance mentioned, the 

 wheels running on the track, and the rails being broken 

 and torn up. There is every reason to believe that the 

 brake which was in this case applied by the driver failed 

 almost immediately, and may, therefore, so far as its effect 

 is concerned, be regarded as having proved worse than 

 useless. The Downton accident, on the South- Western 

 Railway, was another of a somewhat similar character. The 

 only important difference between them was in the loss of 

 life and limb caused. The Wiltshire accident might have 

 been averted had proper brake power been applied to the 

 whole train instead of an imperfect one to a fraction of it 

 There a rupture in the connections permitted the carriages to 

 obey one of Nature's first laws, and, instead of following the 

 engine round the curve, they forsook the rails, and rushed 

 down an embankment into a river. At Penistone the 

 carriages ran down an embankment into a road below. 



Accidents such as these carry with them great and 

 practical lessons, which it behoves each one of us to bear 

 in mind. It is more than proved that one of the essen- 

 tials to safe travelling is that every train should be fitted 

 with an efficient brake — nay, more than this, it is neces- 

 sary that every individual carriage should be furnished 

 with a means for arresting its own progress in the event 

 of its being severed from the rest of the train. 



There are at the present moment several forms of con- 

 tinuous brakes in use — brakes, that is, which are fitted and 

 applied to each vehicle, and one great distinction is that 

 while some of them are capable of performing their allotted 

 task automatically, others only respond to the manipulation 

 of those in charge. These two classes may be typically 

 represented by the Westinghouse and the Smith brakes 

 respectively. And perhaps the respective merits of the 

 two could not be illustrated more forcibly than by quoting 

 their behaviour from the chapter of accidents in July. On 

 the 8th a Great Eastern express en route for Doncaster 

 met with an accident. When nearing Spalding Station the 

 axle of the driving-wheels broke. The train was instantly 

 stopped by the application of the Westinghouse brake, and, 

 a fresh engine having been procured, the train proceeded, 

 after halfan-hour's delay. " Had," points out our con- 

 temporary Engineering, "a similar brake been in use at 

 Penistone, it could have been at once brought into action 



by the parting of the train, even if it had not been applied 

 earlier ; and there are the best grounds for believing that 

 twenty-three lives and much dreadful injury might have 

 been saved." To quote another case, which might have 

 ended in a most dreadful catastrophe : — 



" In reply to inquiries respecting the details of an acci- 

 dent which lately took place near Chicago, Mr. Joseph Wood, 

 the Superintendent, said : — ' The train consisted of an 

 engine, one baggage and three sleeping-car.i, weighing about 

 190 tons. At the time of the accident, the train waa on 

 a descending gradient of 1 in 1 25, and was going at a speed 

 of from 40 to 45 miles per hour. After leaving the rails, 

 the engine went partly down an embankment, taking with 

 it the baggage and the first sleeping-car, and stopping at a 

 point 240ft. from the point of derailment; the other two 

 sleeping-cars remained on the road-bed ; the rear end of 

 the rear car being 75 feet ahead of the point of derailment, 

 showing that from the time of the application of the Vjrakes 

 (when the engine was derailed and broken loose from the 

 tender) to the point of stopping of these cars, they had 

 gone a distance of 370 feet. These facts so strongly em- 

 phasise the efficiency of the brake, that further words seem 

 unnecessary. I may add, however, that none of the 

 passengers were injured sufficiently to delay their journey.' " 



Such is the behaviour of the Westinghouse brake. The 

 Smith non-automatic brake, on the other hand (the type 

 employed on the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire 

 Railway), can only act so long as the various parts of the 

 train remain coupled together, and the whole of the brake 

 apparatus intact. It is controlled from the engine, and 

 anything going wrong with the train, and causing a sepa- 

 ration, the brakes become useless, for even if they are 

 applied prior to the severance, they " proceed immediately 

 to come oflf by themselves." A train equipped with such 

 a " continuous " brake as this, is, under such circumstances, 

 quite as helpless as was the South- Western train at Down- 

 ton, which, as stated above, was without a continuous 

 brake. 



There is another class or, rather, a sub-class of brakes, 

 which, while they respond very well at times, are unreliable 

 if called upon with any degree of frequency. Such a brake 

 is that known as the Clayton, and the use of which almost 

 resulted in a disaster that would have resembled very 

 closely the Downton aflfair. On the 12th of last month 

 a Midland train, consisting of fourteen vehicles, came 

 into violent collison with the buffer stops at Swansea. 

 The passengers who were preparing to alight were thrown 

 together and much shaken, fifteen of them being also cut 

 about the face and head. A doctor was on the spot and 

 promptly attended to the injured. The train was fitted with 

 the "leak off" Clayton automatic vacuum brake, and the 

 driver had applied it to stop about a quarter of a mile 

 from the terminus, on account of the signals being against 

 him. The line was cleared at once, and on again applying 

 his brake to stop at the platform, the unfortunate driver 

 found himself without brake power, and was unable to 

 avoid the collision. This is by no means the first time 

 such an incident has occurred in connection with this 

 brake, and the accident (1) at Portskewet, Northampton, 

 Liverpool, and Bradford, from the same cause, should 

 have made it perfectly clear that this brake is not to be 

 trusted for a second or third application. 



The different forms of brake thus briefly referred to it is 

 my purpose to describe more in detail hereafter. There is, 

 however, one point that may be urged. One of the greatest 

 objections to the uniform adoption of a good automatic 

 brake is the expense. Such a contention is, however, more 

 than answered by a report recently made by Mr. T. E. 

 Harrison, Chief Engineer of the North-Eastern Railway. 



