LIFE IN A STOKEHOLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13497, 25 May 1907, Page 5 (Supplement)

LIFE IN A STOKEHOLD.

HEAT AND HARD WORK. No one with any knowledge of the subject will venture to deny that the work of a stoker, whether on board a man-of-war or on a big Atlantic liner, is undoubtedly the most arduous of any branch afloat. In either service the work and the perils are practically co-equal, and none but the stoker knows what that really means (declares a writer in a - Scotch weekly).

Half-naked, standing in front of mammoth furnaces hauling out red-hot fire what is called cleaning firestrimmers standing by throwing water on the deck so as to keep the heat down as much as possible; little trollies, or barrows, of coal are continually run to his side to be pitched into the furnaces as soon as they are cleaned. The stoker never pauses, save to take a breath or dry his dripping forehead—steam must be kept up at any price, and he tears at it like a galley slave. Twenty tons an hour have to be fed into the glaring furnaces, and the passage of 70 gallons of water per minute through the condensers regulated to a nicety. The safety valves must be held to the verge of rising, which means that the pressuregauge points to 3001b on the square inch. • It is a fine art this firing a boiler. Each one has a distinct temperament of its own. It must be humoured, or. there is no saying what might happen. One boiler may be slow even to sluggishness, requiring to be fiercely stoked in every corner to hold its pressure. Another may be quite the other way, and so intensely volatile that it must be coaxed from its dangerous tendency to undue expansion and contraction by centre firing. Then the gauge glasses must be carefully watched. On no account must the bubbling beads be allowed to drop beneath a certain level, else the screech of a vollied plug will give its shrill warning. And, on the other hand, priming will result if they be' allowed to rise beyond a certain point." He is ever on the border line of danger and death— heroic, if unromantic-lookingl figure, perpetually environed by a host of perils. A gauge glass may burst twice a day, but save for an occasional scalding a man is not often seriously injured by this. Far more ; serious '■>. are the consequences of his opening the doors of his furnaces without first shutting off his forced draught. A careless man may, on starting his watch, forget to shut off the three:checks at: the side of the furnace, which regulate this detail. On opening the door a blinding draught will: fly into his face, and probably scorch him frightfully. i The flying of a fusible plug, , the collapse of a boiler tube, the sundering of a steam way may •be the start of another "awful calamity." During the time the ashes are being sent rip the lives of r the men are in constant danger, either of a bag of ashes or of an empty ash-basket falling on them and dreadfully injuring them. Many a poor ' fellow, in fact, has met his death in this way. J • There is n,o limit to the number of minor casualties. With the roll of the ship tools fly about in all directions. A rake, lying idle at the side of the stokehold, may violently gravitate towards the stoker. To stand in the vicinity of a hatch is Simply to court - danger—anything, perhaps a shovel or a hammer that has been ? mislaid above, may come crashing down. '