From the very outset, however, the difficulties which crowded upon Colonel (afterwards Sir James) Browne, R.E., an officer well experienced in railway and engineering work who was entrusted with the carrying out of the scheme, were unfavourable to the prospects of speed in construction. The surveys which had already been made were found not only worthless but misleading. The first members of his staff were unacquainted with railway work and had to be succeeded by men brought from England. The plant and materials previously collected, but disposed of at scrap-iron prices when the line was abandoned in 1880, had now to be replaced at an almost fabulous cost, owing to the urgency of the need for them.
All these were, nevertheless, minor troubles as compared with the physical conditions to be overcome.
Starting from an elevation, at Sibi, of 300 ft., the line was to rise 6,200 ft. in the 120 miles between Sibi and the summit level at Kach.
Then, for the greater part of the 224 miles to which the line was to extend, the country was a wilderness of rocks and stones—a land of barrenness and desolation, where there was no timber, no fuel, scarcely a blade of grass, and, in places, for stretches of several miles, no water. It was a land, too, almost devoid of inhabitants, while those who did dwell there were described as "a savage and blood-thirsty race of robbers," continually engaged in plunder and inter-tribal warfare, and not growing sufficient food even for their own consumption. Almost everything that was wanted—including supplies for from 15,000 to 30,000 workers and materials for the line—had to be imported from a distance.
Still less inviting was this inhospitable region by reason of its range of climatic conditions. The lowlands have the reputation of being one of the hottest corners of the earth's surface. A temperature of 124 deg. Fahr. has been registered in the Nari valley. The highlands, in turn, offer the alternative of Arctic cold, the temperature there falling in winter to 18 deg. below zero. Between the lowlands and the highlands there is a temperate zone; but here the constant pestilence was dreaded no less than the extremes of heat and cold elsewhere.
As the result of these conditions, the work of construction could be carried on in certain districts for part of the year only, and the workers had to be transferred from one section of the line to another according to the season. Such a movement of front involved the transport of everything,—stores, tools, offices and some thousands of men. "The management of this vast exodus," says Captain Scott-Moncrieff, R.E., in his paper on "The Frontier Railways of India,"[85] "was a work of considerable anxiety and difficulty. A sudden influx of people, such as this, into a desolate and barren land naturally caused a famine. Everything was eaten up, and for some days the question of supplies was the burning question of the hour.... Nine hundred camel loads of food were consumed daily on the works." The customary load for a camel was 400 lbs., but some of the camels carried loads of 800 lbs. up the pass.
The engineering difficulties fell into four principal groups,—(1) the Nari Gorge; (2) the Gundakin Defile; (3) the Chuppur Rift, and (4) the Mud Gorge.[86]
The Nari Gorge, about fourteen miles in length, beginning just beyond Sibi, has been described as "one of the most weird tracks through which a railway has ever been carried. The hills, absolutely bare, rise above the valley for many thousands of feet in fantastic pinnacles and cliffs. It is a scene of the wildest desolation." The Nari river, running through the gorge, is formed by a combination of three streams having but little water on ordinary occasions, but becoming, in time of flood, a raging torrent which fills up the whole gorge for miles, attains a depth of ten feet, and has a velocity of five feet per second. Over this river the railway had to be carried in five different places. Not alone bridges, but heavy embankments, cuttings and tunnels were needed. At one point there was an especially dangerous tunnel in which so many accidents occurred, owing to roof or sides falling in, that at last no workmen would enter it except at a wage five-fold that of the high rate already being paid. The whole work was liable to be stopped for months together, owing to the washing away of half-completed embankments or bridges; though until this portion of the line had been completed no materials could be sent to the sections beyond.