People who study such things know that damascus and fluid steel barrels are about equally strong, if the guns were made by reputable makers, Parker, Remington, L.C. Smith, Lefever and others, not to mention the myriads of quality English guns.
Of course barrels of all kinds can be of lessor quality or poorly cared for and can fail. Most healthy barrels that let go, do so because of an obstruction in the bore...a patch, wad, etc...
Sherman Bell took healthy damascus guns that were not of collector quality and loaded them to failure. He was astounded by how much psi the damascus barrels would take...about three times over maximum proof loads (Remington proof loads produce 18,000 lbs psi). Hand welded (damascus) barrels in good condition are strong. For safety's sake they should only be shot with shells that produce pressures they were made for. Standard medium and low PSI shells should be safe. I shoot them in my Parker and Smith.
Any shotgun barrel can let go, from a new one to one a century old. In the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, shooters considered damascus barrels superior and paid a premium for them. They weren't stupid.
The myth of damascus barrels being weak came from people using BP reloading tools to reload faster burning smokeless powders (again, according to Sherman Bell). Using BP measures to load smokeless shells sometimes produced a shell that produced 80,000 PSI...Most shells produce from 8 to 12,000 PSI.
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