MONSTER STEAMERS.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2320, 24 August 1880, Page 3

MONSTER STEAMERS.

The P. and 0. Steamship Company have given an order to the Barrow Shipbuilding Company for the construction of two high-class steel steamers of about 4000 tons and 3800 indicated horsepower, They will be fitted for a large number of passengers, and are intended to attain a speed of 14£ knots an hour. The City of Rome, tbe new steamer of the Inman line, now being built at Barrow-in-Furness, Lancashire, England, will be a marvel of marine archictecture. She will be 2000 tons larger than the Arizona or the City of Berlin, her sister ship, and 800 tons larger than the new Cunarder, now being constructed on tbe Clyde. She is to cost over £250,000. She will be completed in the spring of 1881, and is to be placed on the line between New York and Liverpool. The dimensions of the City of Rome will be : —Length of keel, 54Gft; length over all, 690 f t; breadth of beam, 52ft; depth of hold, 38ft 9in ; depth from top of deckhouses to keel, 52ft. Her measurement will be 8300 tons. The hull will be of the best iron, and will bo built in the best manner, with 11 horizontal bulkheads and two longitudinal bulkheads through the engine and boiler rooms. Tbe engines will be of 7500 horse-power, •with six cylinders, three of which will be high-pressure, and three low-pressure. It is promised that the new vessel will attain the great speed of 18J knots an hour, the saloon and stale-rooms will bo placed amidships. The Cunard Company have laid the keel of a monster steamer at an establishment on the Clyde. Although not so large as the City of Rome, she will have engines of even greater power, and it is claimed, will he the fastest passenger steamer in the world. The new vessel will be 7500 tons burden, and 10,000 horse power, according to.’ a statement from the “ London Times,” and will he exceeded in size only by the City of

Rome and Great Eastern. She will have an extra promenade deck, and will practically be a fl /e-deexer, being fitted for 450 first-class and 600 steerage passengers, with accomodation for a crew of 200 officers and men. The hull will be built wOli a double bottom, on what is called the longitudinal and bracket system, with ' water-tight compartments. In her construction steel is to be employed instead of iron.