Fire Room
Courtesy: The Library of Congress, Detroit
Publishing
Coal being shoveled into one of the furnaces in the
fire room. This particular photograph is from the USS Massachusetts,
sister ship of the USS Oregon. The men that work in the
fire rooms spent hours and sometimes days without seeing the light
of day and the conditions down here were very dangerous. It was
extremely hot and dirty and the air was thick with coal dust.
The average temperature down here would be about 110 degrees;
hotter if you were in the topics or a similarly hot climate.
Credit: Oregon Historical Society, #OrHi 2158.36
Above: Actual picture of the fire room on the USS
Oregon. Click on above photograph to
see the boiler feed pump.
Your current location.
Cutaway drawing courtesy of the American Society
of Naval Engineers
To Steering Gear Room