The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-08-11

1thA'c ~ 49, 49, 1919 - -
necessary that the ordinary set OF currents
and dangerous i~ndraughts into the deep
bays should Ice known and guarded
against"
'If steamship captains would follow the
practice OF the navy when they get into
such waters says Lieutenant Commander
Sears. In charge OF the New York Hydro
graphic Office. wrecks off Cape Race
would not be so frequent. In the navy,
we are accustomed 10 stop and take sys-
tematic soundings. Little OF nothing could
be proved as To location by taking sound
ings at irregular periods of time. But sup
pose "A ship is going ten miles an hour.
That is a mile every six minutes. The lead
Is dropped and shows. say, forty fathoms,
In six minutes il is dropped again, and
shSws forty-four fathoms. Soundings are
taken at this interval for perhaps an
hour and the results enable any man TO
get his bearings almost TO the inch.
That Is no exaggeration. Old sailors say
that with the lead filled with tallow to
bring up samples of the bottom, a mariner
can pick his way as surely as a man can
find his way in a city by looking at the
street signs. And the method is simplicity
itself. A man need not be a navigator TO
Suppose that the ship is in doubtful wa
tiers. and sounding has begun.
The navigating officer takes a piece of
paper and marks off on its straight edge
the miles on the same scale as that of the
ships chart. At each mile interval he
marks the s~Oundings as they are obtained,
as: "A fathoms, black sand: 46 fathomS,
gray sand: A fathOms, blue mud, and SO
on After ne mas ndO I'VE OF SIX SOQnOlISS
he lays this paper on his chart and moves
it around until the straight edge with the
markings on 1t lies along the same sound,
ings printed on the chart. Then ii need
make no difference to him whether
or not he has seen the sun for days. He
does not need his log. He can tell as surely
where he is as if he had his latitude and
longitude down to fractions of seconds of
"A degree. He is steering by the bottom.
There are thousands p Of sopnd d Yd marked fI0n1
each other in some respect. If the depth
is the same in various parts of the sea the
character Of the bottom is sure to be diff
ferent. So by heaving the lead in minute
/ intervals a navigator can tell where he is
whenever he gets into soundings.
But to sound once a minute means a
steady diminution of the ships speed, and
mercantile sailormen don't wish TO delay
their craft. So often they speed on head
long and trust to dead reckoning. Naval
vessels never fail to take the precaution. A
naval officer who took his ship in a fog
through waters where he can sound and
neglected TO do so would be court-martialed
for IL.
Perhaps man never will learn to fight the
Labrador current any other way. And If
it's present sea pull continues vessels will
have to slow up and sound, nolens volens,
for even the famous bottle messengers of
the United States government. that have
rents of the sea. have failed to betray any
thing about this wonderful icy stream.
Many of the bottles must have fioated into
the Labrador current from the gulf stream,
D0N 1910 A1C PNChNN Up hOdA bHO
American shore. They have drifted as far
as Iceland and Ireland, having traversed
the whirl, but no man can tell how they
did it.
KNOWLEDGE FROM BOTTLES.
Since 1894. when the United States began
it's systematic study of the currents Of all
the seas of the world, thousands of bot
ties have been thrown overheard from
ships in all parts of the globe, and 100 nave
hpQn ra0Ovarpd with fhair rnacSaOac There
is nothing peculiar about these bottles.
They are not even furnished by the govern
ment, so they are of all sizes and shapes.
Many a humble whisky bottle, after doing
man all the good or harm that it could in
its original vocation, has rendered able
service in telling how fast the gulf stream
or the Japan current or some other sea
stream flows and what its course is. All
that the government does to obtain these
results is to distribute pads with little
slips of paper, SKA inches wide and headed
Bottle Paper" Directly under the head
ing is printed in English, French, German,
Dutch, scandinavian, Spanish and Italian
the line: Report Of the Ocean Currents
Then follow directions printed in the same
seven languages explaining just what TO do
with the slips. Under this are blank lines
for the names of the vessel and captain
and a memorandum showing in what longi-
tude and latitude and when the bottle was
thrown over. Under this again are blank
spaces with the request, printed in all the
languages named, that the finder indorse
his name and the locality and time of
finding the bottle and send IL to any United
States consul or to the photographic Office
In Washington.
The first bottle to be launched was thrown
overheard from the steamship Sedgemore
on June 2, 1894. just off Cape Hatteras.
That was the last that was heard Of it
for six years. 1t was picked up at last
on April q, 1900, on the shore of Antigua.
1t was covered with barnacles and seaweed
showing that it had held the seas for a
| long long time and II hoh NOT haan 1yinC
on the beach very long before it was found.
In its wanderings it had been in the Sar-
growths on it's side and bottom proved. 1t
is estimated that it drifted 5000 miles at an
average rate of drift of two miles a day.
The record for the longest distance drift
is held by a bottle which was thrown over
board on March IA. 1897, from the sailing
bark Rockhurst. 1t was dropped in the
of the Cape of Good Hope, and was picked
up on March 20, 1889, near Perth, Australia,
having dr1fted 500 miles in 742 days at a
rate of 1919 miles a day. The next longest
drift In point of time was that of a bottle
thrown overheard from the sailing ship
Belmont on Oct. 10, 1896. 1t was not picked
up until June "a. 1899. 9S7 days later. La
that time it drifted 1900 miles, at an av-
erage rate of az miles, from the Kerguelen
rent to Geraldton, Australia. The shortest
distance drifts on record were made BY
two bottles thrown overheard in the north
Atlantic. One was tossed into the sea from
the British warship Duke of Edinburgh
exactly midway between Labrador and Ire
land. That was on April Is. 1898. 1t was
picked up again 425 days later and il was
only thirty miles from where it had been
set adrift. Yet this part of the sea is swept
by the gulf stream. The other bottle was
dropped on April . by the teamshi Is
trandje off Halifax. 1t was picked up 16s
days later, and it, too. was only thirty
miles away from the spot where it had
struck the water. The shortest and quick
est cruise was that of a bottle dropped
from the steamship Bernard off the Isle of
Pines. near Cuba. 1t travelled seventy
miles in two days, when il was recovered.
Its rate of speed would have put a man
hard TO IL to walk as fast as il drifted.
The longest drift in point of time was
that OF the bottle thrown from the Sedge-
more, 1T having occupied 2.149 days.
TWO LONG CRUISES.
Two bottles drifted 400 miles. One was
thrown from the ship Comliebank, near
the Cape Verdi islands, and when it was
found, 57 days later. it was lying on the
beach at Vera Cruz, Mexico. 1t had
lodged the Windward islands. refused tc
land on the coast of Yucatan and decided tc
stay with Mexico rather than TO be whirled
around in the gulf stream ana sent up to
Iceland.
The other was thrown from the steam
ship Ceres of Ferrol, on the north coast
of Spain. 1t passed westward and brought
up in as days on one of the Bahamas,
having drifted along at the average rate OF
six miles a day.
The himsic notion Of ocean currents is
shown in the widely different destinations
-