Steam Boilers Are Exploding Everywhere

Originally published in March 1881

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"The records kept by the Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Company show that 170 steam boilers exploded in the United States last year, killing 259 persons and injuring 555. The classified list shows the largest number of explosions in any class to have been 47, in sawing, planing and woodworking mills. The other principal classes were in order: paper, flouring, pulp and grist mills, and elevators, 19; railroad locomotives and fire engines, 18; steam boats, tugboats, yachts, steam barges, dredges and dry docks, 15; portable engines, hoisters, thrashers, piledrivers and cotton gins, 13; ironworks, rolling mills, furnaces, foundries, machine and boiler shops, 13; distilleries, breweries, malt and sugar houses, soap and chemical works, 10."

Scientific American, March 1881

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