NEWS OF THE DAY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26632, 1 December 1947, Page 4

NEWS OF THE DAY

Shipping Variety

An unusual variety of ships was in port on Saturday. At the Birch street wharf H.M.N.Z.S. Bellona and the Government's lighthouse tender Matai were moored and at the Rattray street berthage there were two coastal vessels, the Holmdale and the Holmgleni the 7200-ton overseas freighter Fort Grant, and the Otago Harbour Board's dredge Otakou. The intercolonial trader Karetu was at Kitchener street wharf. Looking along Victoria wharf, one could see the coastal motor trader, Paua, while nearer at hand lay two overseas merchantmen, the Australind and the Fort Pic. At Ravensbourne, another 70'00-ton vessel, the Marabank. was tied up. This ship is completing discharge of a 9600-ton phosphate qargo which she brought direct to Port Chalmers from Ocean and Nauru Islands First Offender in Court

The only case to come before the City Police Court on Saturday was that of a first offender, who was fined the amount of his bail (20s) on a charge of drunkenness. Messrs S. Owen and J. C. Elliott, justices of the peace, were cn the bench. Timber Scarce

That the board should communicate with the Government, asking that measures be taken to increase the allocation of hardwood timbers to New Zealand from Australia, was a motion passed at a meeting of the Bluff Harbour Board last week. It was stated that harbour boards throughout New Zealand were short of. hardwood timbers. Local Bodies’ Conference

Members of local bodies in all parts of the South Island will be arriving in Invercargill this week for the annual conference of the South Island Local Bodies’ Association, which will open on Wednesday morning. The conference will extend over three days and arrangements have been made for the entertainment of delegates and their wives, including sightseeing tours. Sweden 'Favours Flats

First priority in the building construction programme in Sweden is given to blocks of flats for workers, according to Mr G. I. Budge, a young Auckland structural engineer, who recently returned from a visit to Great Britain and Sweden taken on an engineering travelling scholarship. He said that in Stockholm, where about 90 per cent, of the population lived in flats, large blocks of modern flats were being built, although there was a shortage of steel and cement. Building costs were high and most of the flats were small ones of two to four rooms.

Production of Coal Four ex-servicemen are producing an average of 250 tons of household coal a week at an open-cast mine at Mangakaru, near Ohura, in the Waikato. Water power and fluming enable them to produce an average of about 65 to‘7s tons of coal per man a week of the period -in which conditions allow them to work. The men are working on a system of 20-acre leases over an area of 110 acres. Top soil is stripped off with a bulldozer, exposing the coal face, the coal is broken up by explosives,, and then the larger chunks are broken up by picks to make the supply household size; and a heavy jet of water, powered by a 90-foot fall from a stream above the coal face sluices the coal to the mouth of a flume, which carries it to a screening plant over the 40-ton capacity storage bins.

Foi rings, watches ana jewellery. ir\ Peter Dick, Jewellers 30 Princes street Dunedln.-J-Advt