£5,000,000 FROM LAURENTIC.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 January 1922, Page 11

£5,000,000 FROM LAURENTIC.

THE YEAR’S WORK ON SUNK LINER. The Admiralty salvage vessel Racer, and her tender, the Canadian drifter No. 1, which left Portsmouth in the spring with the object of recovering the remainder of the gold from the ill-fated armed liner Laurentic, which has been at the bottom of the sea off one of the wildest parts of the North Coast of Ireland since January, 1917, have returned to Portsmouth for the winter. The result of the expedition has been the recovery of between five and. six million pounds’ worth of bullion, and there remains two or three million worth still to be brought to the surface. Operations will be resumed again in the spring. A ship of 14,900 tons, the Laurentic was in the service of the Government as an armed cruiser when she was sunk in over twenty fathoms of water. Of her crew of 475 officers and men, only 121 were saved, among the survivors being her commander, Captain R. A. Norton, R.N.

Over three years’ pounding by the Atlantic swells has transformed the great liner into a heap of twisted debris; and her decks, which settled down on the sea bot.tom, cover an area of several hundreds of feet. The wreck was practically covered with grave] and silt, as it is in a position in which it receives the full force of the Atlantic gales. This obstruction has to be pumped away as far as possible by powerful pumps placed in position by the divers, as the gold was at the bottom of the huge mass of wreckage. The plate girders had to be blasted and cut away by explosives. and the task of the divers was both difficult and dangerous. In consequence of this the Racer carried a recompression chamber for the purpose of treating cases of illness which the divers might contract in the course of their hazardous task.

The vessel engaged in salving the Laurentic is about all that remains of the splendid Admiralty Salvage Section, which was brought into being during the war. With this exception the section Came to an end with the completion of the wreck-raising operations on the Belgian coast. In the case of the Laurentic the rate paid is half a crown for every £lOO worth of gold recovered, and this divided between *all employed in the work is equal to about one half-penny per cent per head.