Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1903-03-28
THE PANAMA CANAL TASK
Ex-senator Harris Tells What We
Are Undertaking.
CONSTANT MENACE OF FEvERS
Great Natural Obstacles and Engineering
Problems Of Unprecedented Difficulty
Must Be Solved.

Must Be Solved.
Ex-senator Harris of Kansas, who
for six years and until March 4 last
was n member of the senate committee
on %interoceanic c%anals. has personally
investigated the Panama canal route
as well as the Nicaragua route. Mr..
Harris Is i famous civil engineer. He
built III -,4asas Pacific railroad. In
speaking az, other night 70 the New
kork Wor. Is correspondent at Wash
ington Of fire tremendous task the Unit
ed States will undertake III completing
the Panama canal Mt. Harris said:
Immediately on taking possession
the great problem Of sanitation must
be confronted. Panama and Colon are
both recognized as canters of infection
for yellow fcver. while the whole line
is continually menaced by remarkably
vlrulent forms OF malarial and other
fevers.
THE water supply everywhere is bad
and insufficient. For over 800 years
Panama, now Il town of 23,000, has
been i~nadequately supplied by water
carts from all sorts Of IMPURE and fe-
yer breeding places. The treaty re-
quires that Panama and Colon shall be
provided with IN adequate water sup
ply and with proper sewerage. 1t is
doubtful whether this work can be
done in two years, while all along the
line an adequate supply of pure water
by distillation or other means must be
provided.
'Work in the great Culebra cut will
measure the time required for the com
pletlon of the canal. This cut is located
about two-thirds of the way from Co
lon to Panama and is the continental
divide. Our commission estimates that
100000 cubic yards of earth must be
/. removed to make this cut The cut is
only seven or eight miles long and is so
concentrated that it makes it difficult
to attack.
''To realize the difficulty of perform
ing this work in the limited space it oc-
cupies let one imagine all of the cutting
involved in some of our longest lines of
railroad concentrated in a little over
seven miles. The cutting at the top
would be nearly a half mile wide, with
a depth in many places of over 200 feet.
The canal itself is to be 100 feet wide
at the surface and 80 feet deep.
'Our commission has recommended
the construction Of a dam at Bohio
somewhere in the neighborhood Of
5000 feet long. For seventy feet Of
that distance pneumatic caissons must
be sunk below the water level from
100 to 1877 feet. The greatest depth to
which pneumatic work has been car
ried on-in the case Of a few isolated
bridge plers-has been about n hun
bred feet. and even at this depth 1t has
been found that men can only work
four hours out of twenty-four in four
shifts Of one hour each. Fifty per cent
of the best men only are able to stand
this work ut all.
"The French plans provided for m
additional level and a much smaller
dam, with locks of much less lift, and
j am strongly of the opinion that the
plans proposed by the international
commission of engineers and adopted
by the French company will ultimately
be found much safer and less expen-
sive.
"Our commissioners recommended fix
ing the summit level at about ninety
feet, with two locks Immediately to-
gether or in tandem. each with a lift OF
forty five feet. The dimensions of these
locks and the height of the lift are also
far beyond anything known heretofore
and involve new and untried problems