LYING UNDER SEA.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 316, 23 December 1936, Page 7

LYING UNDER SEA.

VAST TREASURES IN COLD.

EFFORTS AT SALVAGE. Soon, if wind and current are Lind, the treasure of the torpedoed Lusitania will see the daylight after nearly a generation of darkness, writes A. !*• Luscombe Whyte, in Nash s Magazine. I p till recently salvage lias beer) largely cornered by the Italians and Germans, but the salvage ship r'hpir, which lias located the sunken Lusitania. belongs to a British syndicate which also owns the right in <’<•<> known wrecks and a score of diving Inventions. Success in this instance will mean the launching of a new British industry in which the gains are counted in tens ol millions. The wealth of the ocean bed is inestimable. Some say that the gold, silver, and jewels which may lie raised are worth £1,000,000,(100.

tn Vigo Bay lie the rotting hulls of the greatest of all Spanish "plate Heels," sunk in harbour by a British admiral after its return from Vera Cruz. Of the £21,00(1,000 In treasure, which it holds, little lias yet been recovered. Sunken Turkish Ships. A plundering Turkish fleet, tat with filched Grecian treasures, rests below the still waters of Navarino Bay, sunk over a century ago by ttie Allied fleets Table Bay is tire graveyard of more than 30 ships from centuries-old Dutch merchantmen to modern tramps; a graveyard worth £20,000,000. Off the Venezuelan coast rots the great San Pedro with £13,000,000 aboard. -Near the Lizard £4,000,000 waits in another galleon. The treasures of the old galleons are free for any daring man to take. He can locate them with modern echosounding and root down into their sandy graves with pumps that can handle 1000 tons every hour. Even simpler will be the looting of the many modern bullion carrying ships, though the profits will probably be less. Tor international law compels the salvage man to divide his spoils with the underwriters who paid up on the wreck and to whom it legally belongs. It was the discovery a few years ago of the “Iron Man” suit ’ which brought thousands of sunken shlpi within reach of salvage. The familiar lubber dress was limited to an ext.vine depth of 300 feet, and, even at 200 or 150 feet, work was severely limited in time and scope.

Influence of Pressure. There was a one-word reason for this —pressure. For every 32 feel the diver descends, the pressure on every inch of his body increases by 1,1 pounds, so that at a normal working depth of 100 feet he is supporting a total weight of 45 tons. Only the corresponding pressure of the air, forced down to him from above, holds back the water from crushing him lo a shapeless pulp. While his air pressure is maintained all is well. Deep-sea salvage with the rubbet suit is always slow, and oiler dangerous. But the “Iron Man’’—a modified version of which has been sued 'or the Lusitania job, has taken most of lhe delay and danger out of diving. It protects the diver from the sea by its own brute strength so that no air pressure is needed and an ordinary nan can work at great depths for hours on end. 11 is, in effect, a one-man submarine of strong steel and alloy which completely encases the diver. A barrel-shaped cylinder protects lhe trunk, and smaller cylinders contain the arms and legs. Immensely strong joints give him considerable liberty ol movement, and artificial steel hands claws worked from inside the suit — are accurate enough Io tie a knot in a rope or pick up a coin. With such a suit a diver can work easily at 500 feet or even lower. Tests without human contents, show- that the “Iron Man’’ can go safely down to 1400 feet where the total pressure is about 600 tons. But, owing to the bulk of his suit, the “Iron Man" diver cannot enter sunken ships in search of treasure. He can lay explosives to blow a way down through the decks, and direct by telephone the great wrecking grabs which come plunging down past his head from the salvage ship above. His job is to direct the pulling apart of lhe ship and lhe fishing for its contents. The Greatest Dimculty. Next to the problem of pressure, location has always been the salvage men's greatest difficulty. This difficulty has been largely solved by an ingenious gadget, the echo-sounder, has now replaced “swinging the lead" in most modern ships.