The age-herald., 1899-01-05
THOUSANDS OF MILES
 OF WIRE ROPE

graphic office of the navy is only waiting
 for the word to begin survey of the route
 over which the contemplated cable from l San Francisco to Manila is to pass. That
 portion of the path to be traversed which
 lies between the coast of California and the
 Hawaiian Islands was carefully mapped
 some years ago, but the remainder of the
 track, from Honolulu to Luzon, extends
 over region of sea floor that is as yet un-
 explored.
 The cable will go by way of Hawaii of
 course. and thence to one of the islands of
 the Caroline group. telegraph station, if
 nothing, better, will be obtained by Uncle
 Sam in the latter archipelago. The distance
 from Honolulu to Ualan in the Carolines Is 2,445 nautical miles. From Ualan-suppos-
 ing that particular isle the most easterly l of the Carolines, to be chosen for the stop-
 ping place-the wire rope will extend l,210
 miles to Guam, which becomes the property
 of the United ,tates by the new treaty with Spain. It will cover it's last stretch, 1872
 miles, as a crow would fly from Guam to | the Gulf of Dingaa, which is on the east
 coast of Luzon. To reach Manila 1t would
 have to go round the Island of Luzon, and
 it will be a great saving of cable and of
 trouble also to make the landing on the | east side, connecting with telegraph | crossing Luzon to Manila, only thirty-eight
 miles.
 These distances are all official as record-
 ed at the navy department If that from
 Honolulu to San Francisco, 2,089 miles, be
 added, it will be seen that the total length
 of the cable will be 7,116 miles. This, in-
 deed is practically an exact estimate Be 1t 1 observed, incidentally that the miles re- i ferred to are always nautical miles, which
 are little over one-seventh longer than 1 ordinary land miles. It is estimated that
 the making and laying of the wire rope will
 come to about $1 900 mle so that the en-
 tire expense involved will be only $7,116 000
 This includes everything except the prelim- ( mary survey, which, being performed by
 naval vessel, will not appear as an item in | the account.
 | This rope which is to wiggle it's way be- | meath seven thousand miles of ocean, bring ! ing two continents into close touch and i commun cation, will be an inch and quar- 1 ter in diameter, and will weigh a ton and
 a quarter to the mile. The bill introduced l in the house by MT Corlis of Michigan,
 requires that the cable shall transmit at
 least fifteen words a minute, at not more 1 than s1 a word, press matter to be at half | rates.
 At present a telegram sent from Manila to | New York must go by way of Hong Kong | around Asia, across Europe, and under ! the Atlantic-13,60O miles under water and | 700 miles over land. The cables being con- | trolled by monopoly, the price is about | $3 a word. This monopoly will be smashed
 by the new trans-Pacific line.
 1 The survey of the route of the contem- | plated cable from Honolulu to Manila will i not require many months. The track to be l followed will be straight as possible
 from Hawaii to Ualan, again from Ualan to l Guam, and finally from Guam to the Gulf | of Dingala. This would be modified only | where the bottom was found unsuitable | Drowned mountains may be discovered in l the path, and it would be necessary to go l around them; or there might be submarine | volcanic regions, which are to be avoided 1 not only because of fear of future convul- | sions, but also for the reason that the water | in such subaqucous territory is apt to con- 1 tain chemical ingredients that have a de- | structive effect upon the cable. Apart from l these matters, there is nothing complicated 1 about the surveying, which consists merely | in taking soundings at regular intervals | and obtaining samples of the bottom mate | rials. The sounding line is piano wire, l and has a siXty-pound sinker on the end Of l it. The wire is wound on a reel, each turn l of which registers one fathom, while | dial keeps record of the number of turns 1 a scale showing the. tension and indicating
 the moment when the sinker reaches the
 bottom When this happens valve in tho l bottom of the sinker is forced up, and it's l interior is filled with soil. At the same 1 n nutoma lie thermometer takes the
 temperature of the water, undue heat of | which would indicate volcanic conditions.
 When this work has been finished the ex- l perts of the hydrographic office in Wash l ington will make a profile map hundreds | of feet in length and drawn exactly to scale, | showing the depths at regular intervals all
 across the Pacific. It will be like a sec- ! tional view of the ocean along the whole
 route, the water being represented prettiy
 in blue and the bottom in brown. That part
 of the track which extends from San Fran
 cisco to Honolulu has already been mapped
 in this pofile fashion, and it makes very | interesting panorama picture. Looking
 along 1t sees that at distance of
 fifteen miles from the California coast the
 depth Is mile and a half and from that l point on the bottom shelves gradually until l the floor of the sea, a little less than three l miles below the surface, is reached 200
 miles out. This is vast level plain hills being of rare occurrence. Five hundred and | seventy miles west or san fTanc1ScO tnere ! is huge drowned mountain two and half
 miles high, over the topmost peak of which
 half mile of water flows. This will be | avoided by running the cable to the south
 of it. Six hundred miles from the Califor-
 mia coast the floor of the ocean sinks to l depth of three and half miles, This
 depth is maintained almost up to the
 Hawaiian islands, though 200 miles east of
 Honlulu is another drowned mountain a
 mile and a half in height.
 The Hawaiian islands are merely group of gigantic volcanic mountains rising ab- ruptly out of the ocean floor and so lofty | that the tops of them are exposed above | the surface. Other mountains, submerged,
 may be found along the track from Honolulu to Luzon, but that remains to be
 ascertained After leaving Hawaii the
 cable will quickly sink again to the normal | floor of the sea, over which it will pass ex- l cept when the neighborhood of the Caro- lines or the I.adrones is approached, when i the water becomes more shallow. These l two groups are merely outcrops of high elevations in marine regions where through