Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1912-03-24

-H-4 va tAc S1EStts OF now tney would
look to YOU il you came down 10 the
isthmus. am not an engineer. and l
shall turn the figures into concrete ex-
amples. The amounts here are so vast
that they cannot be realized in figures.
And. besides, figures mean nothing but
dizziness TO anyone but the professed
mathematician and scientist.
You remember the story of the scientist
who sneered at the poet who wrote:
Every moment dies a man.
Every moment one is born
The scientist said: Why, that man is
absolutely wrong. Everyone who has
looked into the latest statistics OF the
human race knows that it is in every
one and one-third minutes that a man is
born. and that it is in the same time
that one dies" l am not sure as to the
fractions In this statement.
Well, in treating OF the canal I shall
deal only in round numbers. A cubic
yard Of earth is roughly a ton. and a
yard Of earth and rock is a big two
horse wagon load. shall reduce the
amounts of rock and dirt We have taken
out to bitches, yard wide and a yari
deep; and the linear length OF the bitches
to miles, using 500 feet TO the mile. for
easy figuring. The actual mile is $3.50
feet. but the figures OF the canal are SO
vast that little thing like that does not
matter.
What the Excavation Means.
For example 100OGO cubic yards OF ex-
cavation would equal a ditch yard wide
yard deep and 10000 yards. or $1,000
feet, long. Now dividing by 5000 feet to
the mile our ditch would be sixty miles
long, or better. a ditch three feet wide
and three feet deep to any locality Just
sixty miles from your home. A million
cubic yards would be ten times the length
OF 10000. 1t would equal such a ditch
90 miles long. and 100000 would equal
one 600 miles long, or twice as long as
from New York to san Francisco
But this canal deals not In millions and
tens Of millions only. Its figures run
into the hundreds of millions. The total
amount of our excavation, when COM
pleted. will have been l95.OO0OO0 cubic
yards. or say. 20o,Ooo,OOo for easy fig
uring. That would equal ditch a yard
wide and q yard deep and 10000 miles
long. II would equal a ditch so big
that the latest hog ever killed at Chi
cago could walk through il with its back
level with the top. and the ditch would
DO long enough to reach four times
around the earth at the equator, and still
leave 5000 miles to spare. 1t would
require enough excavation to make fif-
teen tunnels through the center OF the
earth from one side to the other, and
each tunnel would be big enough for
that fat hog TO crawl through. More.
1t would equal a great column three
feet square reaching from here on the
earth just half way to the moon. II
the tunnel through the earth was in
creased TO ten or twelve feet square II
would not hold the total excavation. and
that tunnel would be large enough to
drive the biggest wagon load Of hay ever
hauled by four horses.
The above estimates will give you some
idea Of the work Uncle Sam has done
and is doing in lifting earth here at
Panama
Al the TOP of the Canal.
The canal. as every one knows, is to
be a lock canal. The ships will be
dragged up and let down by the chagres
river which is being harnessed" by the
Gatun dam SO that its level will be
eighty-five feet above that OF the Carib4
bean and the Pacific ocean at either end
of the waterway. How high is eighty
five feet? 1t is about the height OF a
soveR-story flat, or less than one-sixth
the height OF the Washington monument
Let US make the reduction even more
concrete. Take some man that every
one knows. You have all seen Champ
Clark. the stately speaker OF the house
Of representatives. The speaker is six
feet tall. II fourteen men OF the height
Of Champ Clark stood one on the head Of
the other and the last should play the
part of Atlas by raising his hands he
could just support the world on the level
Of this canal at its highest point above
the ocean.
The minimum depth of the waterway is
forty-one feet. Lean out OF your fourth
story window and drop plumb line to
the ground. You might be in a canoe
sounding the depth Of the Panama canal
The Canal in n Nutshell.
But all this is only preliminary.
shall describe the canal in detail as go
over 1t. In a nutshell 1t is fifty miles
long from deep water in the Pacific to
deep water in the Atlantic. From shore
line TO shore line the length is forty
miles. In going through 1t the vessels
enter Limon bay, magnificent harbor.
and steam thence through the first At
lantic stretch. which is over seven miles
long, to Gatun. The ship is still on the
level of the Caribbean when II gets to
Gatun. but there It meets the great locks
which, filled by the Chagres, lift 1t eighty
five feet into Gatun lake. / will tell
you later how it goes through these locks
and what the locks are Ike.
In the lake itself the steamer may
pass at fun speed to the entrance to the
Culebrs cut, and the same level Is main
tained until you reach the other end of
that cut at Pedro Miguel There the YES
sci enters a lock and drops about the
height OF a three story house into a
small lake which is about fifty-five
feet above sea level. That lake Is
yet to be made, but 1t will be a mile
and a half long and fifty-five feet above
the sea. At the end OF the lake
there are two more locks. one above the
other. which successfully drop it down
from the height of five-story flat to
the channel and on the level Of the Pacific
ocean. Our ship is now only eight and
a half miles from the ocean itself and
Is ready to steam off to China. Japan.