Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1901-11-07
NEW ENGLAND'S FOGS
HAVE ADDED EXTRA HAZARDS TO
THE SEAS. DANGERS.
Many Collisions Result-Can Neither Sec
Nor Hear Plainly In the Wet Mass
A Sea Captain Tells of the Difficulties
of Navigation.

of Navigation.
Nature furnishes new phenomena, or
occasionally revives those that were
familiar to the fathers. An unusual
phenomenon along the Eastern state
coast this season has been punches
Of fog" or fogs that are local, and
banks of 'smoke" that lie close to the
water.
The endless chain of coal towns run
ming on schedule for the Lehigh VAL
ley, Lackawanna, Philadelphia and
Reading, the Staples Coal Company
and others, have CROPPED and twitched
their three and four string barges in
dangerous way through these
punches"
They have collided with lightships
and been guilty Of fool maneuvers.
Sometimes they have missed their
schedule, thereby condemning shippers
and crews to tie up at Boston or Perth
Amboy until their time to start cams
round on the schedule, which is as in
exorable as time table for the rails.
Fog Is Deceptive.
The Lehigh tug Shawanese lay
alongside the north pier, Atlantic dock,
recently, her furnace raising the boil
ers' courage for start from the stake
boat with string of Amboy hulks.
"In fifteen years experience" said
Captain George w. Goldrick, Il never
saw such thick, wet punches of fog.
You can neither see nor hear in it..
Often l have stood on the top of the
pilot house and looked over the top Of
the bunch, directing the mate how to
steer.
ut is the most deceptive fog. One
night, feeling about in the easterly en-
trance to Nantucket sound, heard old
Pollock Rip lightship blow ahead and l
change the course to sou-sou' west.
Next she blew abeam and again ahead.
If it hadn't been for the bell, which is
now as false as the siren, the Lord
knows where we should have brought
| up.
! !, Collided with Lightship.
another time I heard the bell of
Pollock Rip ightship before the siren.
There was only one thing to do. tel
egraphed for full steam ahead, threw
the wheel hard down and whistled the
barges to port their helms to help the
tension on the towlines.
Barge No. usually has 200 fathoms
of line and Nos. 2, 3 and have each
| 100 fathoms. The maneuvers was a
Sheer 1t worked all right until No. 2
came along and he bumped right into
Pollock Rip lightship. The barge had
big hole knocked into her and We
had to anchor.
Execution rock and Block Island
have the best sirens. They are the only
perfect ones. They are a trumpet in
strument of European make. Their
steam notes are of clarion clearness,
sounding in fog like a submarine ex-
plosion. From Cape Ann all the way
over east the government equipment
is very poor.
t'There are other ways of telling
whether you are beside sirens and
BELLS" said Fletcher Cakes, examining
a pipe full. "When the vacuum be-
/ gins to pull down from % to "a and 2d
and thereabout l know we're between
Handkerchief and Pollock Rip light
ships.
Knows Location by Condensers.
"Why, that condenser tells me more
| than the sirens. The more vacuum
the less pressure on your exhaust. You
see, there's cold streak of water run
ming out to the ocean between Hanker-
chief and Pollock Rip, and that's what
affects the condenser. There's another
cold streak from Cross Rip lightship to
\ Nobska point, fourteen miles. The
streak runs about west-no' Invest and
/, east-sou'east
pretty squeezing business in one O.
those wet fogs from Handkerchief to
/! Shoveful Shoals and to Pollock Rip
lightship out through the Slew" unused
the captain.
/ "The slew is twenty-four feet be-
tween two bell buoys. Imagine shoot
ing four barges on a string 5000 feet
long through uoOr IudC you Call see.
''In these fog punches the minute
you get off Cape Cod it's just like
emerging from that blind arch yonder
into light, with Chatham Bar eight
miles into the point, three lights of
Nauset Beach eleven miles away, and
fourteen miles to Highlands light"