The Hartford republican. (Hartford, Ky.) 18??-1926, 1922-03-31
SOME ODD EFFECTS
OF SEAS PRESSURE

As everyone knows the watsr ia:
down in the sea is under considera-
BILE pressure, due to the weight Of the
layers above. The deeper, of course,
the greater the pressure. Scientific
exploration of the sea has shown
that animal life exists thousands of
feet below the surface where the pres
sure is enormous. The creatures in
habiting these dark depths are pc
culiarly adapted structurally TO the
conditions in which they live. The
bony framework of their bodies is
strong, their flesh is dense and the
pressure within is the same as that
without, just as the pressure inside
the bodies of land animals is nicely
balanced against that of the atmos-
phere outside-approximately Is
pounds to the square inch.
The body Of land animal would
collapse if it were immersed in the
sea far below the surface where the
pressure is several times as great as
that for which it was built. The
pressure inside the body Of a deep
sea animal would produce equally
disastrous results If the animal were
brought quickly toward the surface,
into strata of comparatively low ex-
al II n Mi Ic hrnn oh
up by nets and other apparatus for
capturing denizens of deep waters
are killed by this reduction of pres
sure. For this reason scientists have
never been able to obtain live speci-
ments of deep-sea species for study.
Pressure sometimes plays strange
pranks with deep-sea fish. If in
sportive play or in pursuit of prey
they injudiciously rise to too high
level they are unable to descend be-
cause the expansion of the gases in
side their bodies reduces their speci-
fic gravity to such an extent that
their muscles are powerless to force
them down. Thus they literally
fall up" AS they rise the pressure
within and without becomes more
and more out of equilibrium and at
length they are killed by the stretch
ing and breaking of tissues of vital
parts.
A story is told of a ships crew sail
ing in tropical waters at the Christ
mas season. Among the supplies
brought forth from the larder for the
holiday dinner were a number Of
bottles of champagne. AS the wine
was warm and they had no ice they
decided to lower the bottles and
heir contents deep into the sea where
they knew the water to be ice-cold !
Accordingly the liquor, suspended by
a strong wire, was let down far be- ,
ow the surface. When the meal had !,
to the beverage stage the
bottles were drawn up. They were |
delightfully."- cool but on being open
I'll were lOuuu " COnldlHs lHstSdNt VI |
The original sparkling vintage only !
bitter, nauseating sea water. Every /
one of course was keenly disappoint- |
3D.. The officers at once deduced the !
scientific cause of the exchange tho !
/ was then too late to do any good /
so far as providing cold wine for the
Christmas dinner was concerned. The
tense salt water, they reasoned cor
-ectly, had filtered thru the porous
,ork shoppers, gradually forcing out
md displacing the lighter wine. OBJ
'iously the loss might have been
Iyerted II the bottles had been seal
ID with some impervious substance
efore they were lowered into the sea.
I they had been let down too far,
lowever, the pressure of the water
utside might have been so much in