Douglas daily dispatch., 1926-09-14
FASTEST CABLE SERVICE NOW
READY FOR USE, ACCORDING TO
WESTERN UNION ANNOUNCEMENT

I+occurs any section of the cable may
be picked up without difficulty and
the necessary repairs made. To crap,
pie for a broken cable in the black
depths of the ocean seems to be an
almost hopeless task, but so care
fully and completely are the records
kept that the picking up of a, par
ticular section in two or three miles
of water is all in the days work.
When break occurs in a cable
! it is possible to tell from the shore
Aby electrical measurements and cali
culations how far from either end
the trouble lies. A cable ship then
i hurries to the spot which is clearly
indicated on the chart made when the
cable was laid or last repaired
Having arrived at the place Where
the cable is to be picked UP the
cable ship puts over an anchored
buoy to mark the point Of departure
! 1t then steams back and forth across
the line of cable dragging a grapne,
which resembles five pronged an
chor over the sea floor In shaNoM
water an ordinary gfapnel is used
but for depths of a mile or more a
special form of grapnel has been de-
vised which, when it hooks the cable
cuts it in two and h4ds one OF the
severed ends tightly. 1t is a simple
matter, once the cable has been
hooked, to splice in a new section
splice that on.
Most of the breaks, however, occur
| in shallow water near the shore as
there is little to Interfere with the
cable's smooth working i'll the depths
of the sea- Near the shore the cable
has a host of enemies both animate
'and inanimate. The worst Of these
1 especially in the warmer waters, is
the teredo, the boring sea w o m
against whose ravages ships bot
j toms are copper sheathed and wharf.
/ piles are concreted. AS a protection
against the teredo the shore ends OF
cables have a layer of brass tape
wound about them between the gutta
percha insulation and the galvanized
sheathing wires.
1 In northern waters, icebergs ground
/ ing on shoals, often grind the cables
/ flat exposing the conductor or sever.
ling it entirely Once the carcass OF
1
(, of cable, was hauled up by cable
ship. 1t was disclosed that the ami.
mails death struggle had parted the
cable. At another time the story of
what had happened to the insulation
was told by the finding of a sharks
!! tooth imbedded in the cables cover
| ing. Closer in short cables are often
caught up by the travis of fishing
boats which drag the ocean bottom
to depth of 200 fathoms or more.
The first International cable laid from
Dover England, to Calais, France, was
picked up by a fisherman who thought
it was new kind of eel.
The worlds fastest cable, wrapped,
with Perma1loy which gives it its,
speed, was made by the Telegraph
CONSTRUCTION and Maintenance COM
pany of Greenwich, England This is
the oldesA company engaged in the
manufacture of deep sea cables. II
was formed for the purpose of laying
the first successful trans Atlantic
cable which was completed in 1866
Following the failure of Cyrus Field s
first Atlantic cable in 1858 that
courageous American could raise no
more funds in America. He accord
ingly had recourse to England, where
after lengthy negotiations he sue,
ceeded in raising sufficient capitai
to build and lay a new cable.
The Gutta Percha company which
then had practical monopoly of the