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![]() With lessons learned from the Spanish-American War experience, fuel oil began to replace coal in U.S. “Then they’d hoist ‘em over to us down in the coal bunkers and we’d spread out the coal with shovels until all the bunkers - about 20 - were full to the top.” Coal gives way to Oil “All the deckhands would go down into the collier and fill these big bags with about 500 pounds,” the American sailor added. “Our ship held about 2,000 tons of the stuff,” recalled a coal passer from the battleship USS Connecticut in 1907. When the Spanish fleet tried to run the American blockade of Santiago, four American ships were absent…re-coaling 45 miles away. Range limitations and resupply needs made coaling stations critical. ![]() Sailors (with ratings of coal heaver and later, coal passer) labored with shovels to feed massive boilers. Photo courtesy Navy Archives.Ĭoal-fired boilers not only produced dense smoke, they created tons of ash. A battleship burned up to 10 tons of coal every hour, producing dense smoke and tons of ash. ![]() “Britain, by this point, was already the leader in naval, trade and industrial power, and this control of coaling resources only served to strengthen its grasp of power,” he noted in 2011.įleets of coal-powered ships required regular visits to strategically placed coaling stations across the world. In Great Britain - with its plentiful supplies of coal - the Admiralty also resisted making the coal to oil switch, according to Royal Navy historian Steven Gray. ![]() “The only advantage shown was a not very important reduction in the bulk and weight of fuel carried,” the admiral added. “The conclusion arrived at was that convenience, health, comfort and safety were against the use of petroleum in steam-vessels,” reported Admiral George Henry Preble. Photo courtesy Texas Parks and Wildlife Department,īut as Pennsylvania oilfield discoveries continued, Congress in 1866 appropriated $5,000 to evaluate petroleum as a potential replacement for coal to fire the Navy’s boilers. Commissioned in 1914, with coal-powered boilers that were converted to use fuel oil in 1925, the USS Texas “was the most powerful weapon in the world, the most complex product of an industrial nation just beginning to become a force in global events,” noted one historian. ![]()
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