FUTURE FREIGHTERS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 104, 30 October 1933, Page 14

FUTURE FREIGHTERS

, BIGGER AND FASTER

Bigger and faster cargo boats, were forecast by Mr. A. CV Hardy in a. paper read'at. tire Shipping, Engineering, and Machinery. Exhibition. "The pre-slump idea, was, that if a.cargo vessel of tramp type could make approximately 10 knots on a high coal,consumption she. was a perfectly efficient trading weapon," he said. "This is no . longer true. The tramp of the future may well bo a fairly high-speed motor-vessel, built and planned internationally with a speed, of 12 knots or over, and of a size and type which in pre-slump days would have been dignified by th'o name of a cargo liner." There was a distinct tendency to regard with less sentiment than before the masses of old ships which continued to litter the world's harbours. Economy ships had brought about their obsolescence because, of the low fuel consumption for an infinitely greater speed than was possible a few years ago. They would result in the world's goods being carried, in a smaller number of faster vessels of high efficiency. The number of ships per given route must inevitably diminish. World shipbuilding would decrease- in quantity while increasing in quality.