A STARTLING PREDICTION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 2 December 1913, Page 4

A STARTLING PREDICTION.

Is it possible that the Panama Canal will become obsolete in a few years because of inadequate dimensions? Mr Elmer L. Cothell, an American, engineer who is now engaged in widening the inouth of the Amazon river, says this very thine;. He «avs that in 1898 lie read a paper before

the Americun Association for the Advancement of Science, in which lie predicted that in half a century the nations would be building ships 1000 feet long and 100 feet wide. His predictions were ridiculed, and lie was called tho "Poet of Navigation," but the ship on which he recently crossed the Atlantic, the Imperatbr, was 918ift long and 98ft wide, and tho Vaterland will bo 980 ft long and 100 ft wide. The Panama Canal is to bo 110 ft wide, and if the Vaterland were to pass through she would have only sft of leeway on each side. Mr Corthell goes on to isay that neither is the canal dee]) enough. It is to be 40ft deep, and the Imperator draws 39£ ft of water. A ship of that size must have 3ft to sft of water under hoi-, and therefore this particular vessel would be unable to use the canal. And it is impossible to doubt that in a- very few years even these marine measurements will be surpassed, since there seems now to be no such thing as reaching the limit in anything.