Elmore County Republican. [volume] (Mountain Home, Idaho) 1910-1915, 1915-10-30
IS T|RELEss GAME
Hunting Of Submarines Like
Playing Hide and Seek.
Most OF the Romance and Action Of
Sea Warfare 10 Now With
the SeapIanes and the
Destroyers.
BY FREDERICK PALMER.
international News Service,

sAO pAAP0 WIN GO 6A0Au hCCt 10 tuS
Atlantic liner which has been trans
formed into q mother-ship for the sea
planes. There are platforms In placs
of the ~promenades where passengers
used to lounge. bombs In place Of
deck Quoits. and the dining salons
have been fitted up as workshops
Everything that a ~seaplane needs In
the way of repairs can be supplied.
A ran that once had taken pas
sengers' trunks out of the hold lifted
a seaplane of q platform and deposit
cd 1t on the water, where it bounced on
the waves before the motor was start
ed and 1t SKINNED across the surface
for a hundred yards or more, rose, cir.
cled around the feet two or three
times and then disappeared out at sea.
Most of the a and the action
OF sea warfare while the British grand
feet waits for the German feet to
come out are with the seaplanes and
the destroyers. The dreadnaughts re
main in harbor. except for occasional
cruises into the North sea; but the
planes and the destroyers are always
on the move. They work together In
hunting Fritz" as British officers
and men universally refer to submar-
ines.
A submarine is visible to an aviator
when 1t Is cruising below the surface.
1t eve travels deeper than thirty or
forty feet and leaves a characteristic
ripple and air bubbles and streaks of
oil. When a plane has located a sub
marine 1t signals the hunters where
to 80. But before they arrive a squat
may have hidden the track. A sub
marine may be known to be In a Ger
tain region and be lost and seen and
then lost and cen again. Submarine
hunting Ia q tireless game of hide-and
seek. Naval ingenuity has invented
no end Of methods OF location and O
destruction. Experiment has proved
some to be effectual, and some useless
Strictest kept OF naval secrets these.
Very thin Is the skin of a submarine
and very fragile and complicated its
machinery. 1t does not take much of
a shock to- put it out of order or a
large cargo OF explosives to dent that
skin beyond repair.
"The difficulty Is to know when you
get them." an officer explained; "for
1t is In the nature Of the submarine to
sink. whether vitality injured or not.
1t may have gone to the bottom to
stay In fifty fathoms of water, or 1t
may have submerged under a choppy
sea and made safe its escape. We
have been hunting them for a year
now, and no doubt we are getting the
better of them. We have not only
learned how to keep them off from our
great ships, but how to destroy them"
II oil and bubbles come up for a
long time In n place or IL they come
up with q rush, that Ia considered
fairly good evidence Of success. There
10 no escape for the crew. They can.
not make the submarine rise or get
out OF 1t. It becomes a steel casket, In
a watery grave. No nautical mind is
required to realize that by casting
about IN the bottom with a grapnel
you will learn II an object with the
bulk and size of a submarine is there;
and the death" of submarines is es-
tablished in this way.
"The admiralty will not accept any |
guesswork about It," said an officer.
I'VE may have put an explosive right
into one Or rammed 1t In a way that
must have broken its back; but that |
is not proof enough. The record goes |
down on the chart as supposed de-
stroyed.'"
With Admiral Crawford, the CORE
spondent went to see the submarine
defenses of a harbor. Cruisers and de-
stroyers and auxiliaries are going and
coming. but the narrow openings
through which they passed were
closed instantly they were by.
At M naval base the correspondent
saw a number OF destroyers lying
moored to a quay as close together as
fish In q basket. They had just come
In from q tour at sea.
Here today and gone tomorrow, ;
said an officer. What a time they
had last winter! And they are in for
another winter Of 1t. You know how
cold the North sea is-no, you cannot
unless you have been out In a torpedo
boat dancing the tango In the teeth OF
that bitter wind, with the spray whip
ping up to the top of the smokestacks.
In the dead OF night they would come
into this pitch-dark harbor. How they
found their way is past me. It's a trick
Of those young fellows who command"
II a destroyer gets on the track of
a submarine II has thirty knots against
the submarines six or eight. There
is no difficulty In keeping up; her
wireless brings swarms of assistance.
Every ship ON the blockade from
Iceland to the British channel is also
q part Of the system Of submarine
hunting. They show no lights; there
are no lights along the coast at night.
1T gives n an idea of England's
maritime resources" said an officer,