Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 April 1894 — Locomotives and Storms. [ARTICLE]

Locomotives and Storms.

A correspondent of the NorUnvestem Railroader advances some odd theories to account for the frequency and severity of storms i n moder n - times. He gives the figures to prove that there are now over 30,000 locomotives in actual use in |hc United States, besides the hundreds of thousands of stationary engines of all kinds and sizes. From a round 30,000 locomotives he estimates as much as 63,000,000,000 cubic yards of vapor each week,7,000.000,000 cubic yards a day, all to be returned as rain—“quite enough,” he says, “to produce a good rain-storm every twen-ty-four hours.” lie estimates other engines of all descriptions at 180,000— probably a very low estimate —and concludes that these, with the locomotives, Bond about 470,000,000,000 yards of vapor into the air every seven days. “Is it not enough.” he asks, “to give us floods of terrorP” Hundreds of gaswells sending their poison into the atmosphere; millions of cesspools and sewers. Would it be any wonder if some blighting plague would lay waste the land?