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65
To the Assistant Secretary (Railway Department)
Board of Trade.
Sir,
I have the honour to report that, in accordance with your
direction, I have to-day made an inquiry, as above, at the offices of the
St. James's, &c., Company.
Besides the Company, the London County Council and the Vestry of
St. James, Westminster, were represented.
I found that there was no dispute as to the facts, which the Company
admitted were accurately set forth in the letter from the St. James's
Vestry to the Board of Trade, dated 20th October, 1891, except that it
appeared that in the case of the accident which happened on the 14th
September last the Company had a tent erected over the position of the.
street box, the cover of which showed signs of internal heating, as soon
as their attention was drawn to it by the Vestry, and stationed a watchman
at the point.
The full facts of this accident are as follows : —
The conduit and mains in this part of Piccadilly were laid down
before the Company obtained a Provisional Order under the powers conferred
by a licence. The Company were advised that these powers did
not authorise them to interfere with the service pipes of gas or water
companies.
Consequently, in place of laying their conduit in a straight line, they
have avoided these obstructions by winding the conduit, as a rule, in a
vertical plane.
This gave rise to numerous depressions or inverted syphons of rather
sharp curvature in the line of the main between street boxes. Any water
finding its way into the conduit would naturally collect at the lowest
points of these depressions, and a small quantity of water would thus be
sufficient to fill the conduit up to the level of the conductors when the
curvature was sharp.
Such a depression existed close to the street box where heating was
observed, the street box being considerably above the level of the lowest
point of the conduit. The water appears to have found its way in owing
to a temporary saturation of the soil by a defect in a service pipe to a
hydrant in close proximity. The conductors were probably completely
submerged for several yards.
E