The Longest Pipe-line in the World— Britain's Part in Mighty Enterprise
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BRUISH, American and French interests are concerned in rapid preparations that are now being made to start the construction this month of the longest pipe-line that has ever been built. It is the Iraq petroleum pipe-line, which will traverse a length of 1,200 miles from Kirkuk, in the Mosul oilfield area, to the Mediterranean seaboard.
Scammell, Thornycroft, White, International and Renault lorries with trailers, and Hillman touring cars are already engaged on the work. References I to the special British vehicles have been made in these columns.
'Generally speaking, the whole enterprise, on which over £10,000,000 will be spent in three 3ears, is to be tri-national. The staff of engineers and skilled men will consist of Britons, Americans and Frenchmen. Contracts for supplies are held by firms of the three countries. Construction headquarters are at Haifa.
The distance of the pipe-line through British mandated territory (Iraq, Trans-Jordania and Palestine) will be about 470 miles. From a point six miles' west of the river Euphrates, at Haditha, the double line of pipes from Mosul bifurcates, one section proceeding to Tripoli, in French Syria, via Palmyra, and the other to Haifa, in British Palestine, via Rutba.
There are to be between thirteen ana fifteen pumping-stations, of which three will be on the double line between Kirkuk and Haditha and five or six on the British section of the line to Haifa.
At one point, in the Jerdan Valley, the line drops to 850 ft. below sea level. At another, on the mountain plateaux of Trans-Jordania, it will rise to 2,700 ft. above sea-level. The necessity for pumping stations to maintain the pressure a the oil through the pipes climbing to that altitude is, of course, paramount.
According to the terms of the concession with Iraq, the Iraq Petroleum Co., must complete the work by 1935.
Forces will be provided at suitable points by the Governments of the territories concerned to protect the camp, men and materials, If, as is expected, the Baghdad-Haifa railway is eventually built alongside the petroleum pipes, it will serve to open up a vast virgin hinterland that has lain barren for untold centuries.