Word: caisson
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Ordinary air is composed of four-fifths nitrogen and one-fifth oxygen and smaller amounts of other gases such as carbon dioxide. The oxygen content of air is the only part valuable to man in breathing. When men work in certain types of caissons, in diving suits or diving bells, they are subject to great air pressure. Under these circumstances, nitrogen goes into the tissues of the body. When the external pressure is released, as by coming out of a caisson or being raised to the surface of the water, the excess nitrogen in human tissues tends to form bubbles...
Many inexplicable accidents have been attributed to the lack of physical adaptability of pilots in the rarefied air and intense cold of great heights. To investigate this important problem, the French Air Ministry has constructed a pneumatic caisson from which air can be withdrawn at will and which can be cooled by means of a refrigerating machine, so that the occupants of the chamber may be made to experience these effects. Into this chamber three well known French military aviators, armed with oxygen tanks and clothed in fur costumes, were recently introduced and "ascended" some 30,000 feet without leaving...
...artillery caisson partly blocked the road, and three poor horses were down. Three men of the gun team had already dragged one horse out of the road and had a trace around another's neck sliding him to the side. It was very dark--only a pale moon and a few stars...
...French sergeant flashed a light and pointed it o show us just enough room to squeeze through between the caisson and the ditch while his men went steadily on without haste yet with efficient "team work" and no conversation, clearing the road. And this was no place to linger, as the next one was always due to arrive...