Hi
Could anyone tell me what exactly is the function for the barrels located at the edge of these kind of bridges? I’m guessing it has something to do with fire, but not sure how they’ll work. Thanks.
Redleader, you are exactly correct. They would have water in them and the train crew would use what was available to disburse the water onto the fire. Sometimes it looks like alot more wood then water. Don’t know what their save ratio was.
I’m with Bob…one or two barrels of water probably won’t stop a trestle from burning to the ground if it somehow caught on fire. Maybe it was one of those ideas put into practice to resolve a “safety issue” that some beauracrat came up with??
There’s a long way from burning ember to logs on fire. Water can seriously retard the process.
The “somehow” would be hot objects falling from overheated bearings, cinders from the coal-burning locos, etc. The barrels were meant for a train crew to put out a small top-fire made by a passing train, not for brush fires that might creep up to the footings and upward.
What? ? And we as teenagers back a century ago thought the barrels were for us to throw into the river below, I have no idea how many barrels ended up rusting in the creek, and I’m sure the next generation did exactly the same thing, the platform was very useful when a steam engines did catch us on the trestle, it gave us a place to stand ( as we trembled and the fireman sprayed us with hot water), aaahhhh youth.