Like A Troubled Bridge Over Waters

There!  Tonight's Title CANNOT Be Confused With A James Bond Film

Conrad defies you to come up with any connection.

    Okay, Conrad officially hates you.   Let me just go kick the Motley -

     I still hate you and now my toes hurt.  Motleys have a tough hide.

     Anyway, tonight's post has 0% to do with that Simon and Garfunkel (whom I have called "Slimey and Garglefunk" so often it's an effort not to type them that way) effort "Like A Bridge Over Troubled Waters" - 

    DOG BUNS!  BITTEN BY THE COINCIDENCE HYDRA AGAIN!

    Let me explain.  I have been watching "Lovecraft Country", and the loathsome sheriff therein has just been messily expiring in a puddle of slime and blood, and not before time, either.  Art?

It gets weirder

     Tic has also tried to explain how, in Episode One, he had to shoot the sheriff (bit of an in-joke there, ta very much COINCIDENCE HYDRA!).  Seeing matey above get his just desserts naturally led Your Humble Scribe to recall that Bob Marley standard "I Shot The Sheriff", and here I was deciding to play some Spotify, since I cannot also watch "Rewind" whilst crafting deathless prose.  What comes up as the first track I select?  Art!

     Here an aside to an aside <checks over shoulder for Coincidence Hydra>.  The lyrics to the above state "I shot the sheriff but I did not shoot the deputy".  O no?  A bit of an ambiguous statement, Bob, frankly.  Is there an implication that the deputy was present yet not slain by the narrator? in which case said deputy was being derelict in their duty, having seen their senior gunned down in cold blood.  So - the deputy didn't return fire yet ended up dead?  Are we now positing a second gunman?  Or a deputy so wracked with guilt that he commits suicide?

Condemned in his own words!

     Or - is this a plea for clemency, as Our Narrator chose not to kill the deputy? who then died at the hands of a second, mystery, assailant, or whom killed themselves in remorse.  Bafflingly obtuse.  Bad Bob!  Naughty Bob!  No gravy on your potatoes at tea-time!
     Where were we?  O yes -

     Bridges.  Not Beau nor Jeff nor Lloyd, but railway bridges.  Used to convey the rails over obstacles, usually watery ones, and typically of very stout construction, as they need to carry the weight of hundreds of tons of locomotive, tender and loaded rolling stock.  Consequently, not something you can whip up in a hurry.

     

A railway bridge at Vincennes

     Now, consider the railway network in France in late 1914.  As the French fell back in front of the Teutons, they sabotaged various railway bridges in order to hinder the invader.  Not stop them, for the Teutons, organised as ever, had temporary rail bridges on hand to gap over the water obstacles beneath.  Still, that takes time.  Contrarily, when the Teutons were retreating, they blew up railway bridges to hopefully slow the French down.  Art?

     It's not completely clear, so allow me to point out the marked "breaks" where bridges were missing.  Perfidious Albion had absolutely no answer to this; the canny French, on the other hand, were already prepared.  Allow me to explicate:

     This engraving shows the components of a "Marcille" portable bridge at top.  These would be railed to where a bridge had been destroyed, then erected in order to prepare the temporary version.  Art!

Construction begins on one bank of the river

     The temporary bridge is then propelled across, supported on floating pontoons.

Halfway there!

That bridge is over the River Marne, if you're interested

     And here's a shot of the whole thing once completely across the obstacle; in this case the Marne, which is not a minor challenge.

     This, then, is the "Pont Marcille", which is pretty obscure in terms of description and operation.  Count yourself lucky I found these pictures by substituting "Pont" for "Bridge".  Your Humble Scribe isn't sure how long a period these pictures were taken over, though if that river is the Marne we can guess at September; things start and end in daylight, so perhaps eight hours as a reasonable guesstimate.  Remember this factoid the next time someone trots out the "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" label.

      Well that was a trot around the houses, wasn't it.  Let us now get back to demolishing things, instead of boring old reconstruction.

How To Safely Demolish

So far we've had explosives, and wrecking balls, so let us now move on to excavators with adapted arms, utterly unlike those ones as used in the Idiots At Play photographs seen on BOOJUM! previously.  Art!

    This is High Reach Arm demolition.  As is plainly evident, the extended arm has shears at the end, which are used to gradually demolish a structure from the top downwards.  A minor yet critical point.  If done from the top, then the structure isn't going to be undercut and collapse, as we have seen occur when totally inappropriate machinery is used on the bottom levels of a building.  It's not especially quick as a method, but it isn't going to kill people either.

Ha!  Take that, building

     Conrad is currently listening to the sounds of fireworks; people seem to have waited until tonight to go exploding shizzle, as there wasn't much in the way of sounds on Bonfire Night itself.  Good; they upset the dog*.


Finally -

If I were to say "I'm glad that's over, now we can move on" it would in fact refer to that previous paragraph, because Bonfire Night, along with Halloween, has been used as an excuse for people to demand money with menaces for an age.  Not only that, Halloween has become increasingly South Canadianised, which is always a source of worry.  One suspects they are trying to get their own back for losing the War Of 1812.

     What can possibly go wrong at a Bonfire Night event?  Beer, fire and explosive devices all to hand at the same time, plus people trying it on before Lockdown Part Two commences.  Who'd be a fireman on Bonfire Night**!

They WHAT?!

*  Conrad himself is not too keen on sudden loud noises.

**  Shouts of "Ray Bradbury" will be ignored.