The new North-west. [volume] (Deer Lodge, Mont.) 1869-1897, 1888-05-04
FOR THE LIFEBOAT.
AN ENGINE NEEDED TO DRIVE IT
THROUGH THE SURF.

SN clN0IlN6 Nc6OCO ~ O6vvE ~
M THROUGH THE SURF.
Perhaps Some Yankee Inventor MAY Sue
coed Where British Ingenuity Has
Failed-Dangers of Succoring tho Ship
wrecked-Exhausted Men at the Oars.
1t is not a little discouraging to those inter-
ested in maritime affairs, and particularly
to those interested in devices and schemes for
saving the lives Of the shipwrecked, to read
that the efforts Of a committee appointed on
Oct. l., 1887, by the Royal National Lifeboat
Institution of Great Britain, to obtain q plan
for propelling a lifeboat by som other means
than oars in the hands Of its crew, had en-
tirely failed. In December, 1886, while en-
deavoring to save the crew of a vessel wrecked
on the coast Of Lancashire, a lifeboat and her
crew were overwhelmed by the waves and
lost. The disaster was of the sort to rouse
the attention Of the entire British nation, and
the Royal Lifeboat institute at once set about
improving the lifeboats in service along the
British coasts.
Among other steps taken was the appoint
ment Of a committee, consisting Of Sir Fred
erick Bramwell, F. R. S.; Sir Digby-Murray,
Bart, and Mr.. John ~Thornycroft, all men
having special knowledge in the matter be-
fore them, to solicit drawings and models
from inventors and manufacturers of life
boats Of some new craft to be propelled by
some power other than manual labor at the
oars; such, for instance, as steam or cleo
tricity. The committee were empowered to
offer gold and silver medals for the best of
these proposed devices, should any be offered,
while the successful inventor would, of
course, have received a number of orders for
boats from tho institution as soon as tho
award was made. Entries closed on Oct. l,
at which time so many had been presented at
the rooms of the committee that it has taken
all the time of the committee for nearly four
months to complete their examination of the
devices. Sir Frederick Bramwell, who writes
the report, says that no design worthy of a
silver medal, or ever of special mention, was
found. The British inventor having failed,
perhaps some Yankee may now succeed.
LAUNCHING THE LLFEBoAT.
The need of some such device for propelling
lifeboats becomes apparent when the condi-
lions under which. the lives of the ship
wrecked are saved are considered. The
wrecked ship drives ashore in a furious gale,
taking ground perhaps half a mile from the
beach whence the lifeboat must be launched,
and always, too, if along the American coast
south Of Montauk Point, on a bar a good
many hundred feet from shore. The patrol
man brings word to the crew, and, il it be
night, the men must jump from their warm
hunks and hasten out into the wind and sleet
or snow that chill them through and through.
The labor of dragging a heavy boat over the
sand is not enough to warm them before they
must wade out into the icy surf that drenches
. every thread they wear, and then, as the boat
floats, leap in and grasp with benumbed
fingers the heavy fifteen foot BARS and pull
for their own lives, as well as the lives of the
sailors on the stranded ship. The next wave,
if it does not hurl them back on to the sand,
half buries them in its freezing cold depths,
and then leaves them with coats and wraps
weighed down with ice.
Unmindful Of the discomforts and terrors
around and before them, the life savers
struggle on, and eventually reach the lee side
of the wreck to find their labor only just
begun, and their danger, especially from
floating and falling spars, greatly increased.
A line must be made fast to the ship, over
which the solid water sweeps with tremen-
dous force, and then the sailors, who are
dashed in the rigging and are helpless, must
be lowered into the lifeboats. 1t is a work
requiring the nerve and strength of a man
in his prime, undiminished by previous exer-
ton, but it is performed by men who have
been, perhaps for an hour or more, straining
every nerve to its utmost tension in the effort
to reach the ship.
AND1NG THROUGH n U n
One hour, may be two OF three, must pass
before the sailors are all in the boat. Human
powers, even in the best trained men, have a
limit beyond which they cannot be strained
and stand the test. Encountered by the load
in their boat, exhausted by their labors in
securing the load, the life savers at last cast
of the line that holds them to the wreck, and
with weakened grasp take up the heavy oars
to face the gravest danger to which a mariner
is ever exposed, the danger of landing through
q heavy surf. Small wonder If even the
thought of this danger fails to flag into ade-
quate action the worn out muscles of tho
men, and they drift toward shore rather
than row with the wind and waves, and fail
at the critical moment to pull toward the
open sea, and are caught by q booming roller
and thrown headlong into the black depths
at its base, and finally are cast dead on the
sand, from which they had launched their
boat to ave the lives of others.
The propelling power of the lifeboat is como
when it is most needed. 1t ought not to be
either O difficult or an expensive thing to
provide such q boat with some other sort of
driving power. The boat is not hard to
propel. 1t is about 26 feet long, z wide and
SO deep. It is decked over on tho plano of
the water line, and the hold beneath is divided
into compartments, which are usually filled
with cork and paraffine wax or some such
light substance, SO that if the compartment
be broken open it will not fill with water. 1t
requires o crew of six oarsmen and a coxswain.
II an adequate propeling scheme were pro-
vided, one of these men might be dispensed
with. After the boat was launched and his
weight saved, if the ~propelling device weighed
500 pounds, it would therefore net but a little
over 800 pounds additional weight for tho
boat, but something ought to be made in
these days of tempered steel and aluminium
that would weigh less. If some of the men
who are taking out patents for car couplers,
railroad switches, end washing machines at
tho rate of a dozen q week, with no reason
able hope Of ever getting the price of tho
patents out of their devices, were to turn their
attention to lifeboats, something worthy the
attention at least of the Royal National Life
boat institution, perhaps even Of a silver
medal, might be produced. When it is con-
sidered that such boats would readily sell for
$500, perhaps 5000, each, the margin for
profit is apparent at least to q boat builder.
New York Sun.