Snipping the Flames From a Natural Gas Well 



Two streams of water were played in such a 

 way that they formed a pair of water-shears 



moned. He had never seen 

 a gas fire before. He 

 amazed the local gas en- 

 gineers by setting about to 

 put it out with water. Men 

 protected by sheet - iron 

 shields played the hose on 

 the fire from opposite direc- 

 tions. The streams met at 

 the base of the flame and 

 the force of the contact 

 caused the water to be 

 flattened out in the form of 

 a horizontal fan. This 

 sheet of water was edged in 

 under the flame, thus shut- 

 ting off the supply of gas 

 from the point of ignition. 

 The water was raised rapid- 

 ly after the retreating flame 

 to prevent back firing. By 

 this method the fire was ex- 

 tinguished in ten minutes. 



The men who played the hose 

 on the flames were protected 

 by great sheet-iron shields 



A sheet of water was edged 

 in under the flame, completely 

 shutting it off as at right 



THE largest natural 

 gas well in the 

 world, near Monroe, 

 La., burned for five and 

 half days and wasted 264,000- 

 000, cubic feet of natural gas. 

 Men who had had experience in 

 fighting such fires were baffled by the 

 magnitude of the blaze and the fierce heat. 

 After all the known methods of fighting gas 

 fires failed, William Guerin, formerly deputy 

 fire chief of New York city, was sum- 



708 



Special Cars for Per- 

 sons Carrying 

 Parcels 



ANYONE who has ever 

 l\ had his knees bruised 

 by bulky parcels carried 

 by passengers in street cars 

 will hope to see a plan re- 

 cently adopted in Paris 

 carried out in his home 

 town. The Metropoli- 

 tan, the Paris under- 

 ground railway, has in- 

 troduced a number of 

 second-class compart- 

 ments without seats 

 for the special con- 

 venience of passengers 

 with bulky parcels. 

 The compartments are 

 on the order of those 

 p ovided for freight on 

 ordinary trains. This ex- 

 periment has resulted in far 

 greater comfort for all the 

 passengers. Occasionally a passenger 

 will object to being compelled to board 

 the special car with his bundles, but as 

 a general rule no trouble is encount- 

 ered. 



