The Eureka sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1902-current, 1913-05-31
GREAT RICHES At
BOTTOM OF THE SEA
Inventors in Every Part of World
Working on Devices for Re-
covering These Sunken
Treasures


Hundreds Of millions of dollars worth
of gold. silver. copper and precious
stones are lying on the bottom of the
sea. ready to the hand Of the frs per-
son who will devise means of recovering
them. Inventors IN every part of the
world are building submarine boats.
diving armor, dredging apparatus aud
other devices. solely for the purpose of
finding aud bringing to the surfacs
these suDken treasures.
The two main problems to be solved
are those of protection against water
pressure and of providing light in which
to work. The latter problem is more
easily solved than the former. Modern
developments in electric lighting make
it practically certain that powerful
searchlights can be devised which will
give sufficient illumination for salvage
operations at depths as great as 400 feet.
Divers who have been down 100 feet
agree that even when the sun is shining
brightly, the ocean depths are in semi
darkness. which increases as one de-
scends.
The other and more serious problem
is that of pressure. The ordinary divers
equipment depends upon q constant
supply of air pumped in from above,
and rubber suit with metal helmet,
all air-tight, or nesrly so. to keep the
water from rushing in the minute the
pressure of air pumped through the hose
becomes less than the water pressure
from outside. Theoretically. of course.
the air pressure could be maintained at
a point that would equalize the water
pressure, but what would become of the
diver? Men working in compressed air
cassions. under a pressure of 40 pounds
to the square inch are risking their lives
land 45 pounds means a depth of only
l04 feet of water. At 200 feet the water
pressure is little over S616 pounds to
the square inch at 250 feet it is over
f68 pounds; at 800 feet it is 130 pounds
and many of the sunken treasure
ships lie at even greater depths.
Very few divers have descended as
deep as 100 feet. One adventurous
young man went down 1876 feet in Puget
Sound, but on a second attempt his
helmet was crushed by the So pound
water pressure and he was hauled up
dead. Two English naval officers are
said to have descended 2l0 feet, but
could remain at that depth only few
seconds.
The problem of getting down to the
deep. lying treasure ships. therefore, is
essentially one of constructing a mech
anism sufficiently rigid to Withstand the
terrific water pressure II must carry
its own supply of oxygen. since any sort
of flexible air tubes would be crushed
fiat long before depth of 400 feet Is
reached. and it must be so constructed
that the diver inside it can accomplish
something after he reaches the wreck.
even if he can do nothing more than at
tach graphing hook to copper ingoti
The encouragement for inventors work
ing along these lines is found in the
knowledge already at hand of wrecks
bearing treasure, some of which have
been sunk for hundreds of years. In
1902, Spanish fleet carrying quanti-
ties of gold from Santo Domingo sunk
off the island of Santa Lucia at an un'
known depth. in a hurricane that drove
the ships of Christopher Columbus into
a nearby harbor for safety. From then
on, for two centuries, the record OF the
Spanish conquest of America is filled
with reports of sunken treasure ships
bearing the riches of Peru and Mexico
back to Spain.
Probably no diver will ever reach the
wreck of the Titanic, which lies two
miles deep in mid Atlantic, where the
water pressure reaches the tremendous
force of 4,574 pounds to the square inch.
but it is easily possible that some OF the
inventors now working on the main
problems involved will reap incalculable
riches from wrecks yet to be discovered
at depths of thousand feet or more
Frank Parker Stock bridge, in the June
Popular Mechanics Magazine.