Military Engineering.
Some of the most important military operations in South Africa depend upon the speedy but reliable construction and restoration of bridges, culverts, and railway linea, From a constructive point of view, bridge restoration occupies the most important position. Although the sleepers of a railway can be des-troyed-and the rails rendered useless, it is not e&<y to damage the earthworks or caul ings, and the most efieetive way of retarding the opening of a railway line is to destroy the culverts and bridges. Foreign nations keep in store complete sets of standard sizos of military bridges, suitable for different spans. Engineering says that our own military engineers have never been founJ lacking in ingenuity. During the Peninsular War, Colonel fciturgeon restored a bridge at Alacantara with a span of 90 feet, and a height above water level of 150 feet, by means of cables supporting a network of ropes, on which the road was laid. Large timber was unattainable at the time and this led to the adoption of the expedient referred to. The bridge setved to transport the heaviest artillery of that date. The conditions to be filled by an emergency bridge are now more trying, since a structure capable of carrying field artillery may be quite inadequate for railway traffic. In no country has more emergency bridge work been erected than in the United States, both in war and in peace. There the practice has been to use timber practically exclusively for such work, and it is in this connection that "Engineering" recommends our engineers to turn for hints as to the most rapid methods of re-establishing railway communication in South Africa. The astounding records of work that have been accomplished in the United States seem to prove the advantage of timber, even if it has to be transported some distance. One force of 1 200 men built 83,000 feet of trestle-work in eleven days, and laid 38,000 feet of track. During the terrible floods outside the Conemaugh Valley, many bridges were carried away, and in one case four 180 feet spans were roerected in fpur days, and in another a trestle 730 foet long by 50 feet high was built across the Jaanita Liiver in six days. The military engineers,,- of Franco, for some reason or other, are not so successful in this respect as those of Germans and Britain. Serious defects in the French designs of military bridges were shown by the accident to the temporary bridge erected across the Adour at Tarbes a couple of years ago. The bridge had a span of about 150 feet and it failed by Duckling under its test load, owing to the absence of efficient cross bracing between the the main girders.
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Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume II, Issue 97, 18 January 1900, Page 3
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454Military Engineering. Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume II, Issue 97, 18 January 1900, Page 3
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