ENGINEERING FEAT.

Taranaki Daily News, 20 December 1918, Page 7

ENGINEERING FEAT.

SALVAGE OF A WARSHIP _j a harbor of Southern Italy there is a warship that floats upside down, writes the naval correspondent of a London paper. It ib the hull of the battleship Leonardo da Vinci, and its present position is a great testimony to modern Italian engineering. The ship was sunk by an internal explosion more than two years ago, and in sinking she turned upside down. Her groat gun turrets sank more than 16ft into the soft mud of the harbor bed and anchored the wreck there as firmly as if it were bedded in concrete. There seemed to be nothing for it but to break her up for serap iron. Certain men, however, line! a plan. They built queer little houseboats and placed them all round the wreck. Into these they put masses of machinery. They bought miles and miles of gigantic piping. They bought sixty expert divers. They then proceeded to pump compressed air into the wreck. The divers put patches on where they we;re needed. Week after week the work went on without apparent result. Then it was decided that the gun turrets must be amputated. A great sling was passed under the wreck to hold the weight, and the two ends were supported by strong tugs. Divers chiselled and sawed away at the thick armour, and at last released the "null from the anchored turrets. It floated gently to the surface upside down. I have walked on the keel of tnis uncommon casualty of the wav. Great air tabbies sizzle found tlie sides from small leaks in the piping that carried the compressed &i r The engines in the house-boats throb and pound away hour after hour Small towers stand out of the rusty hull here and there, and out of one of them I saw a figure emerge more horrible than ever was by the mo3t decadent draughtsman. It was a diver coated from helmet to leaden solei jn a sitae of ooze, oil, and seaweed. He had been down in the interior, by means of one of the air locks, and had walked about the deserted decks —on the ceilings and not on the floors —making repairs. Presently the upside down ship will be taken into dry dock to be rebuilt, and in the end the Italian engineers ! expect to float her out right side up and ready to take her place in the fighting line.