The Detroit times., 1911-05-30
.DRYDOCK BUILT
AROUND maine
Construction Of Cofferdam To Circle
Wreck of Inflated Wsrship Is
Novel Engineers Feat.

| HAVANA, May 3O.-As an engineer
ing feat the dry-docking of sunken
vessel as she lays on the bottom Is
without parallel That's what they
are doing ID the battleship Maine IN
! Havana harbor They have surround
ell the battieshfp with an elipitical
/ cofferdam OF AUDITING cylinders, ~
OF them, so feet In diameter, made OF
a ring of interlocking steel piling.
driven deep into the bottom clay and
] filed with hard packed clay to the
top, three feet above the level OF the
bay.
II is figured that the grip OF the
piling, 70 feet long, driven 40 feet In
to mud and clay, and the weight OF
$500 cubic yards OF rock and clay in
each cylinder, would stand up against
the pressure OF 35-foot depth OF wa
ter about the ship.
Col. w. NJ. Black, army engineer, OF
New York, headed the commission.
Lieut.. Col. Mason NJ. Patrick, OF Nor
folk, Va, was another member. The
third army engineer on the commits
sicn-Capt. II. b. Fergusop--was sent
to Havana last summer and given
charge of the work His first assis-
tant has been A. c. Harper, United
ST. css sIfsiiTaSs' IssSS II -. Merrill, .
young man from Warrington, Fla. Is
junior engineer on the Job. Charles
8. Boardman, inventor OF the pilins,
is here, too. These piles are fiat steel
bars which dovetail on their edges
like matched lumber 4 piling being
a a., In &c
the pile adjoining and then lowered
carefully into the water. II Is then
driven home In the clay. When line
of them are in place they are thor
Ioughly interlocked.
The trick is to make the last pile
needed TO complete the circle meet
the dovetailing on both sides OF t..
Pile driving In bay with strong tides
and considerable sea Is none too ac-
curate. Ten OF the 20 cylinders have
exactly 14S piles each, the number
specified None of the other 10 varies
mere than six pieces.
Five thousand tons Of steel were
driven. A small village 81 men I've
out beside the sunken Maine. Board
man and the government people lived
on big Mississippi dredge. Electric
arc lights were strung and the vicin-
ity at night resembled factory on an
island In Havana harbor; 200 Spanish
Negroes, Jamaicans and Cubans work
ing at the big tubes ~ hours a day
I'm three shifts.
The cofferdam has long diameter
of 400 feet and Ii 200 feet across the
short way. To give further strength
arcs OF steel piling were driven from
one cylinder to the next. some dis
lance outside the tangent points. The
esg-shaped dam. 200 by 400 feet clears
the ends OF the sunken vessel by -
feet On each side II is co feet from
the nearest cylinder TO the vessel
AS each completed cylinder filled
with clay became dry ground. shoDs
and equipment we're placed on them
and by May the engineers had steel
braced island around tho Maine.
After the difficult job still ahead
OF removing the wreck OF the Maine,
the cylinders of clay must be remov
ed, the piling drawn. and the whole
vicinity dredged The obstruction u
tho small harbor that has become part
Of its landscape will then he no more
Congress appropriated s600,909 FOR
the work. X Is expected that this
amount will carry the work only TO
the start Of the removal Of the wreck
age