HILL BLOWN OPEN.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1707, 26 March 1913, Page 8

HILL BLOWN OPEN.

30,000-TON QUARRY BLAST ON MR. BALFOUR'S ESTATE. ' Thirty thousand tons of rock were dislodged by a quarry blast last month on Traprain Law, a dome-shaped hill 724 feet high, in East Lothian, on the estate of Mr. A. J. Balfour. ' The work, which has engaged attention for somo months, required tile boring of a mine nearly 100 feet long. Within a chamber at the inner end was inserted 31001b. of ammonal grain, an .cxnlosivo consisting of ammonium nitrate and nowdered aluminium. The shot was fired by electricity from a distance., A largo crowd .witnessed tile spectacle. Tho whole of the front of the. hill appeared to burst open, yet there was littlo or no report. Stone was scuttrred in comparatively small quantitirs, but some of the boulders which rolled down the embankment weighed from 10 to 30. lons Bv ordinary quarrying it would have taken between six and seven years to perform what .the blast accomplished.

In a paper read Mire (lie floral f-oeietj of Arts in London, Mr. Leon Gister, lion, secretary of the Illuminating Engine-ring Society,'said that of late years the question had arisen as to whether the niultiplicntion of bright lights in the streets, with their dazzling effects 011 drivers and pedestrians,jwas not sometimes responsible tor traffic accidents. For driving a traction engino. which did not consume its own smoke as far m ixissible—it emitted dense black smoke in the streets—a Sheffield firm wits fined .£3 and 235. costs. >