The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1909-05-07
THE SCIENCE OF SALVl
BY FREDERIC J. HAsKIN.

lens that arise Some years ago the
Milwaukee ran onto the rocks OH the
English coast 1t was soon IOuhu ma a.
to get the vessel off intact was out OF
the question. The forward part was 50
damaged as to be practically WOrthless'
so they built heavy bulkheads across thS
beam amidships. dynamited the forward
I art away and tcwed the after part SAFE
to port. where a new forward portion
was built onto il The same thine- al
most, happened with the Seuvic. another
large vessel. In its case both the stem
and the stern parts were saved, and II
was flowed into port in halves, and there
made over into as perfect looking snip
as II it had never met with an accldehI
One of the most peculiar accidents that
ever befeI a ship happened TO the Aus
trel. in Sydney harbOr some years ago;
She was coaling. and the officers mad
neglected TO close the lower port holes.
During the night she listed to staTboard
and sank in ten fathOms Of water
Golfer dam was erected around her su-
perstructure, divers closed the port holes
which were left open, and big pumps,
throwing ton of water a second. were
set to pumping the water out OF the hoid
The ship soon rose TO the surface as an
empty bottle tightly cOrked will come
to the top Of the water. She was little
the worse for the experience.
Perhaps one Of the most remarkable
examples of a ship commander making
the best Of the resources at hand, was
when the Esk COllided with an iceberg
Seeing that unless he was able TO tighten
his ship all hands would 20 to the bot
tom, he tied up to the berg. unlOaded his
cargo on it and repaired the damaged
hull. Then he transshipped his cargo
hack to the Esk and continued his jour
ney.
What constitutes the brightest chapter
in all wrecking history was the success
Of the japanese In raising the Russian
ships that had been sunk at Port Ar
thur. Where the United States has not
been able to raise the one lone Maine in
II .Naas.N
nearly everything at Port Arthur. Over
100000 tons Of war engines were brought
up from Davy Jones locker and added
to the effective fighting strength Of the
japanese navy. II the United States had
raised the Maine. and all Of the ships
sunk in the battle of Santiago besides.
It would not have constituted half the
/ task that the japanese successfully IN
dertOok. The fact that the ships were
blown up by the Russians in such a way
that they hoped they could never be
raised. adds TO the lustre Of the triumph
Of the japanese in floating them. Most Of
them were lying in from forty TO fifty
feet Of water.
The English are nov. engaged In an
enterprise Of more than ordinary interest
1t is an attempt to rescue the treasure
from the wreck Of the British warship
Lutin, which was sunk in 1871. and lies
buried in the sands Of more than cen
tury. large metal tube 100 feet long
and about eight feet IN diameter has
Z
there has been built a tiny house with
water-tight windows and doors in II. The
divers will go down I'm this and use It
( as the base Of operations. The sand will
1 all be sucked away from the wreck by
I great sand pumps, and then will begin
/ the work Of securing the treasure.
This action of the English finds a
counterpart in the efforts to raise the
! Spanish Armada. The Dutch sailors at
tempted to do so several centuries ago.
I but their efforts at salvage all came to
I naught. Napoleon afterward undertook
/ ii. but with equal i'll success. Later the
/ Spaniards undertook to raise the sunken
craft, and they succeeded in getting the
D treasure from most of them
/ The modern ship devoted to salvage and
| wreCk-raising is an intricate and power
/ ing a ton Of water in the time it takes
/ to say Jack Robinson: it's equipme Mt
/ Of pneumatic hammers, drills and rivit-
erS, which can do the work OF hundreds
/ of men in less time than they could: its
I great wrecking cranes which can lift
/ hundreds of tons, all lend effective as
/ sistance in cheating Davy Jones out OF
/ his victories.
The records of the patent office show
| that Abraham LincOln's thoughts once
/ turned more to the sea than to state
/ craft He invented wrecking appara-
/ tus, whose principle has since come into
use. He had two boats Joined together
/ by huge beams. They were intended to
/ straddle a wreck Gables were to be
] PsSs-u uiluGt LIe Hutis while steam
/ winches on the salvage boats were to do
/ the lifting, the principle employed being
much the same as in the great travelling
cranes in big machine shops.
/ It has been estimated that the tonnage
/ lost at sea is only one-sixth as great to-
| day as it was thirty years ago. although
/ the aggregate tonnage has increased
/ threefold. In other words. the ocean is
| eighteen times safer today than II was a
| Quarter Of a century ago But even at
/ that there are a thousand craft of one
kind or another lost each year.
Z Copyright 1909. by Frederic J. Has1in }