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REFUELING DEMANDS CLOSE CO-ORDINATION BETWEEN BRIDGES
The author of the article on the opposite page urges that the bridge talker in the ship providing fuel pass headings continuously to the bridge of the fueling vessel. The photo shows USS Forrest Sherman (DD-931) drinking from USS Des Moines (CA-134). Note the sign on Forrest Sherman’s bridge—“FILL-ER UP!”
5. Cruiser came right smartly to parallel the oiler’s announced headings and then eased out.
Once the two ships were steady “off course” and parallel, both returned to assigned course and resumed the fueling.
The most important factor in keeping this an incident rather than a collision is believed to be the action of the talker. His station was by the pelorus and his orders were to pass headings any time the oiler was two or more degrees off course. This is vital.
In the second incident, the carrier was fueling from the port side of a Neosho-class oiler on a beautiful, calm day. Distance was being maintained at 140-150 feet, and pumping was proceeding normally.
The helmsman on the oiler is reported to have allowed the ship to get three degrees off course toward the carrier. The oiler’s Operations Officer, stationed on the port wing, caught the error and ordered the helmsman to “mind his rudder.” The latter did so—in the wrong direction. The oiler was suddenly closing rapidly. Fifteen degrees left rudder on the carrier started her to the left. This was followed by “right full rudder,” as the sterns of the two ships came toward each other rapidly. It seemed like an eternity before this rudder took effect; the sterns are reported to have closed to a distance apart of 6 to 8 feet.
Once clear, the carrier came back to course and pumping was resumed.
Two things were not done. Headings were not passed from the oiler to the carrier; after the vessels stopped turning left, they were not steadied parallel and off course. The rapid return to course of the oiler almost caused a stern collision.
The Commanding Officer of the oiler in the second incident reported that he had been using his best helmsman. The tanker helmsman involved in the first incident was a top hand and well qualified. Yet both “goofed.” I believe this will happen again to others and offer three suggestions for replenishing:
1. Indoctrinate talkers on all ships to pass heading information whenever the guide ship is more than 1 degree off course.
2. If two ships alongside do get off course, steady up and then bring both back to course in the normal manner.
3.On a CVA, maintain 140-160 feet between ships in good weather and more as required when the sea is moderate to rough. When a CVA is at 80-100 feet from a Cimarron-class oiler, the latter carries approximately 20 degrees rudder toward the CVA; at 140 feet, only 7 degrees of rudder are required. In addition, a minimum of 140 feet allows some margin for error on the part of either helmsman.
UNDERWATER SPACESHIPS?
We are faced with a dilemma in preparing crews for space trips in the years ahead. No ground simulators of space capsules seem adequate to meet all the difficult training requirements to prepare our astronauts for circumnavigation trips around the Moon, Mars, and Venus before this decade is over.
The Navy’s centrifuge at Johnsville, Pennsylvania, is adequate as a money-saving simulator for a single astronaut in giving him the feel of a short trip around the earth of only a few hours’ duration, encompassing three or four simulated orbits and re-entries. But this time-saving training device fails to meet the needs for training two or more astronauts at any one time, for its capsule is not large enough for the job.
The nearby Air Crew Equipment Laboratory, at the Philadelphia Naval Base, which does have a larger, motionless space cabin simulator, has another serious deficiency as a worthwhile space crew training device. Last year, when the six Navy volunteer ground- based astronauts came out of their eight-day “trip to the Moon and back,” I asked them a
question about their psychological feelings during their grind.
“Oh, we weren’t scared,” one of them told me, “because we knew that we were on the Earth all the time.” Even though they didn’t know how many days they had been locked up in their model spaceship, or what time it was (they had no watches aboard), they all came out smiling and seemingly well adjusted after their “ordeal.” “It was only make believe,” another one told me. “We knew we’d make a safe landing!” This element of absolute, assured safety removed one of the primary unanswered questions about the reaction of normal men to long periods of close confinement in tight space quarters. This question concerns the ability of the individual members of the space crews and the team as a whole to adapt themselves to the hazards involved once they get off the pad.
Such material malfunctions as premature burnout, engine explosions, fuel leaks, communications failures, meteorite punctures, guidance errors, improper landings, and oxygen cut-offs can lead to serious mental disorientations and psychological quirks in the minds of crew members. No space cabin training device located here on earth can duplicate these potential occurrences and their potential degrading effects on the crews.
There is one untapped resource available that would appear to meet the needs for a more realistic manned space trip to the Moon and the planets. This device-in-being is our fast-growing fleet of nuclear submarines.
In many respects, the living quarters of a submarine, particularly a nuclear-powered submarine with the capability of staying submerged for weeks and months at a time, are more akin to the future cabin of a spaceship than any of the simulators now built.
It is submitted that the fear of having a submarine hull punctured by the jagged tooth of a submerged iceberg is similar to the fear of having a spaceship punctured by the prong of an unseen meteorite, and that this similarity makes the nuclear submarine a valuable training device for astronauts.
There are similarities in guidance between missiles and submarines, with Nautilus using a modified Navajo missile inertial guidance package to navigate successfully under the North Pole for the first time. The darkness of the submarine’s medium, where sonar probes in the murky deep for dangerous obstacles, presents another similarity with the physical conditions which man expects to encounter on his first deep penetrations into outer space.
The one peculiar physical aspect of space flight which even nuclear submarines will not be able to duplicate, however, is the state of weightlessness, which will also have its obvious mental, as well as physical, effects on space crews. Although we have been able to simulate weightlessness in C-130 airplane cargo compartments, where our astronauts have been floated around in the padded quarters for as long as 14 seconds, no simulator capable of producing zero gravity for prolonged periods of time has yet been perfected.
A future comprehensive space crew training program could well combine living in an operating nuclear submarine with skin diving experience. Astronauts in training could be sent on expeditions away from submerged, but relatively motionless, nuclear submarines, both to acclimatize them physically to the conditions of space, and—more important— to help them conquer loneliness, darkness, claustrophobia, and the fear of a dangerous environment.
ROYAL NAVY’S MISSILE DESTROYERS
HMS Devonshire, first of the Royal Navy’s four “ Courtty”-class guided missile destroyers, was launched at Birkenhead last June.
These ships will displace about 5,000 tons standard, and nearly 6,000 tons full load.
Devonshire was laid down in March 1959 and is expected to be in service by early 1962. The other three ships of the class, Hampshire, Kent and London, will all be in service by 1963.
The ships will have three main roles:
1. Escort duties with a task group, including providing guided weapon antiaircraft defense for the group and augmenting its antisubmarine capability.
2. Offensive operations as part of a task unit of light forces, including bombardment in support of land forces and attacking light forces with gunfire.
3. Police duties in peacetime in any part of the world.
In addition to Seaslug, an 80-mile missile, each ship will carry four radar-controlled 4.5-inch guns in twin mounts and two close- range Seacat antiaircraft missile launchers.
For ASW purposes the “County”-class will carry the latest long-range sonar, presumably the Canadian type which is now being evaluated by the Royal Navy at the ASW school at Portland.
A Westland Wessex helicopter, carrying both the new type sonar for dunking and antisubmarine weapons, will be carried, and a landing deck is included in the ships’ design immediately abaft the after smokestack.
The ships’ own antisubmarine gear will include two triple Limbo launchers and six torpedo tubes for homing weapons.
The ships’ main engines are of an entirely new type. They consist of two sets of geared turbines assisted by gas turbines. Total shaft horsepower will be 60,000, giving a speed of 32.5 knots. By using the gas turbines, it will be possible to get underway in a matter of minutes without waiting for the correct pressure to be raised in the boilers. At high speeds, the gas turbines will provide an additional boost. Both the steam and gas turbines were designed by Associated Electrical Industries, and the latter are also being built by this company.
An operations room of new design will be fitted in the ships, and they will have the latest air and surface search radars. Electronic plotting equipment will be similar to that fitted in the fleet carriers Victorious and Hermes (see pages 142-145, April 1960 Proceedings). A new type bridge will allow maximum visibility with a high degree of protection against weather and fall-out.
To combat radioactive contamination, the ships will carry “pre-wetting” gear, and both engines and boilers can be operated automatically from a gas-and-fall-out-proof control center. Crews will be able to live in and fight the ships from fall-out-proof citadels.
Stabilizers will be fitted to help provide a steady gun platform and helicopter landing deck in bad weather.
The crew of each ship will number about 33 officers and just over 400 ratings. As in many other new and modernized British warships, bunks will take the place of the traditional hammocks. The use of bunks will give maximum space for fittings such as chairs, tables, lockers, and so on. Power sockets are to be provided for personal electrical gear such as shavers.
★ ★ ★
All compartments will be air-conditioned, and, again departing from tradition in the Royal Navy’s smaller ships, ratings will be fed on a self-service system. Vending machines and ship’s store will supply hot and cold drinks, ice cream, candy, and so on.
ANALYSIS OF SOUND
The ocean is full of random noise and echoes. A sonarman can get an echo from shrimp, fish, wrecks, rocks, bottom, wakes, and kelp, as well as from a submarine. It takes a mighty good sonarman to tell the difference with 90 per cent reliability. He must have acute hearing, a delicate sense of pitch, and enough brains to interpret what he hears. These are also the qualities required of a musician. A musician gets nowhere without training, however, and neither does a sonarman. There’s the rub. Training a sonarman to classify echoes at sea is expensive.
It takes one submarine and one destroyer to train one sonarman. That means about 400 men and about 40 million dollars worth of equipment to teach one man to recognize a submarine echo. Teaching a sonarman in a helicopter or submarine is essentially the same problem. He must get lots of opportunities to hear that echo or he won’t recognize it when the chips are down.
The solution to this prohibitively expensive training appears simple. Why not build a synthetic classification trainer? An echo is only a sound, and we have had high fidelity sound reproduction methods for years. For about a year we have had such a trainer. It was ten years in development. One reason the classification trainer took so long to get was the rapid changes in sonar equipment that took place in the last ten years; even now it is obsolete for the newest type of sonars being installed. However, the echo simulator has been very helpful in training sonarmen, particularly in the beginning phases. Sonar school instructors estimate that it reduces the need for shipboard ping-time by 50 per cent.
The classification trainer has a number of
THE BEST DEVICE FOR TRAINING A SONARMAN IS A DESTROYER AT SEA
significant limitations. In the first place, the submarine on the classification trainer is a captive submarine. This means that the sonar operator cannot use all the controlling dials on the equipment. He cannot use mode, pulse length, and target display. Yet he ought to be so skillful that he could use these controls without looking for them, almost without thinking about them. This he cannot learn to do on the trainer. There are other shortcomings. No one ever got seasick on a classification trainer. Noise level in the trainer room is much lower than in a sound shack, and the precious ingredient of aggressiveness is missing. On the trainer, the sonarman cannot advise the bridge on how to keep after the submarine. All he can do is track the echo.
There seems to be a general impression that now that we have better sonar equipment, the sonarman’s job is easier. The equipment is much better, therefore the sonarman ought to do much better, according to many people. Actually, the opposite is true. The newer equipment is much more complicated. It takes much more time to teach a sonarman how to maintain and use the new equipment so that he will operate it at full potential. There is a wide gap between the potential of the equipment and the ability of the sonarman to realize that potential.
Besides the increased complexity of the equipment, the sonarman has a more difficult task because the quality of the echo has deteriorated with the new sonars due to their lower frequencies. The older equipment had a metallic echo. The new equipment produces a flat, low-key echo. Sonarmen find the low- pitched echo much more difficult to classify, so that, again, more training is required to learn to identify the low-pitched echo produced by a submarine.
Doppler effect is also more difficult to hear on the new sonars, also due to lower operating frequencies. In surface-ship ASW, doppler is defined as the difference in pitch between the outgoing signal and the target echo. This difference can be expressed by the formula: Af=2f0Vi/v where / is the doppler shift in cycles; F0 is the frequency of the outgoing signal; Vi is the target motion in the line of sound; and v is the velocity of sound in water. This shift is about 0.7 cycle per knot per kilocycle. From the above formula it will be seen that the frequency shift is proportional to the frequency of the outgoing signal. Naturally, then, a new, low frequency sonar produces less doppler effect than an older, higher frequency sonar.
In the older sonar, the frequency shift was more than three times as high as in the new equipment. The significant loss of pronounced doppler effect has made the classification of targets much more difficult for the sonarman, because detection of doppler has always been one of his greatest aids in determining if he had a moving target, a basic piece of classification information.
The sonarman’s task is also made more difficult by the greatly increased detection ranges at which the new equipment requires him to detect doppler shifts. With the short ranges of the older equipment this was fairly easy. Almost anyone with normal hearing could do it, but now it is almost impossible at the maximum ranges of the new equipment. Sound travels at the rate of 1,600 yards per second in water. For a target 10,000 yards away, the sonarman would have to remember the sound of the outgoing signal for comparison with the returning echo for 12.5 seconds. There are not many sonarmen who can do this, and as the ranges get longer, none of them will be able to do it.
Thus the equipment has grown more complex, the quality of the echo has deteriorated, and the doppler effect is almost lost. The training of the sonarman should have been increased to accommodate for the increased difficulty of his problem. Instead of more training, however, the ping-time for sonarmen has been on the decrease. There are fewer destroyers in commission, which means that the remaining destroyers must work harder to meet Fleet commitments. Very seldom can they be spared for the sole job of training the few sonarmen on board.
Sound is the only currently reliable way we have of detecting, classifying, and tracking submarines. There are other means being experimented with, but we don’t have them yet. Until we do, the ears and brain of the sonarman must serve as the audio analyzers for this expensive and complex equipment. Unless these human audio analyzers are kept peaked up by training, we will never realize the full potential of our sonar equipment.
HOW IT WORKS—
THE RADAR DATA COMPUTER
By William G. Allen,
Chief, Division of Operations, Maritime Administration, U. S. Department of Commerce
The U. S. Department of Commerce announced on 9 October 1960 that the Maritime Administration was letting a contract for an experimental Radar Data Computer. This is a device which accumulates and stores the outputs of existing radar sets with each successive revolution of the scanner. Up to ten individual targets are gated in bearing and range, and tracked. The stored information is used to develop signals indicating the course and speed of each target relative to own ship. From these signals, the computer will generate target tracks, which are continuously compared with the information subsequently received. Thus, the intermittent, raw, radar data is converted to continuous information by extension for decision-making by the conning officer in his efforts to avoid collision. The mechanics necessary to arrive at a decision are reduced in quantity, and the quality of the decision arrived at is improved. The equipment could conceivably be used to maneuver the ship through a situation automatically but this particular gear stops far short of that and deviates to a display unit.
The display equipment projects the computer signals in plan form on the face of a cathode ray tube. The plan display consists of velocity vectors for each target. Essentially the plan display will be an electronic plotting board to allow the conning officer to determine promptly whether his ship is privileged or burdened, the potential collision angle, and the time and distance to a potential collision if no action is taken, and to display the result of any test action the conning officer might want to try out. The velocity vectors are expanded so that relative position may be observed at any point without long tracking intervals. All this takes place in fractions of seconds. It is anticipated that the computer will be a navigational aid suitable for use with any merchant marine surface search radar equipment to provide rapid presentation of essential information to permit accurate recognition of dangerous situations.
The Maritime Administrator has allocated in excess of $200,000 to develop a piece of hardware with these capabilities, the need for which has long been obvious. From the initial item, it is anticipated a commercial unit will evolve. The present equipment is not a commercial unit. The eventual commercial unit may or may not incorporate any or all of the features desired by the Maritime Administration. For instance, a great deal of flexibility has been included in the prototype unit, but it may be concluded from the evaluation that some of this flexibility is not practical or is unacceptable by the marine industry.
As an example of this flexibility, one can point to the number of targets to be tracked. The capability to track ten targets may eventually be too sophisticated to be incorporated in the commercial unit. Another example is the separation of the tracking unit and the computer unit. It is not difficult to visualize one compact unit eventually housing the radar, tracker, computer, and display. Such refinements are for the future, however.
The National Bureau of Standards, Data Processing Systems Division, during its evaluation of the numerous proposals received by the Maritime Administration, suggested that for best performance and economy, analogue techniques have a decided advantage over digital techniques for both the radar tracking circuits and for the computer and display system contemplated.
The subject of analogue versus digital technique is a highly controversial one within the industry. The Maritime Administration did not make its selection on the basis of whether the proposal contained analogue or digital components, and it has formulated no opinions in regard to which circuitry is best. It is worthy of mention here because this is a “bridge” the industry will have to cross sooner or later, and the decision will have a primary effect on the cost of producing the commercial units.
NUCLEAR SUBMARINES HAVE SHOWN THE WAY TO THE POLE
Crewmen from USS Skate (SSN-578) (top) scattered the ashes of the polar explorer Sir Hubert Wilkins as an icy gale blew across the Pole on 17 March 1959. A photoflash (bottom) illuminates the sail of USS Sargo (SSN- 583) poked up through the ice into the polar night.
THE NOTEBOOK
Submarines in the Arctic: The earliest recorded thoughts that a “submarine ark” should be used for “submarine navigations” was advanced by Bishop John Williams in 1648 in his book Mathematical Magick. Subsequently, Dr. Vilhjalmar Stefansson, Sir Hubert Wilkins, and others have advanced ideas concerning using a submarine for arctic exploration. Stefansson relates that his idea germinated by observing whales surfacing in the leads or “polynyas” in the arctic pack ice off Banks Island near the spot where Sea- dragon emerged from McClure Strait. Stefansson expressed his views to Sir Hubert Wilkins, the late British explorer, who was with him at the time. Then in 1931, Wilkins became the first man to attempt to take a submarine actually under the ice. Wilkins had purchased the submarine 0-12 from the U. S. government for one dollar, renaming her Nautilus. After spending thousands of dollars on his submarine, Sir Hubert attempted futilely to penetrate the ice; but casualties to his aging sub forced him to turn back and abandon his scheme.
The Germans demonstrated during World War II that diesel-powered submarines could carry out effective independent combat operations in the Arctic areas, in the fringes of the ice pack. They carried out various missions against the Russians in the Kara Sea. The United States enlarged on the German experiences with its own submarines between 1946 and 1953. It was found that in many ice areas the submarine can go where the surface ship cannot go since she can submerge, proceed under the ice, select an open area, and come to the surface to charge her batteries.
These facts were used to begin ice pack studies. Following is a list of scientific studies conducted by submarines in ice areas since 1946:
Summer of 1946. USS Atule in the Kane Basin under the edge of the ice pack for 1,000 yards.
January 1947. USS Sennet (SS-408) to the Ross Sea in the Antarctic. No dives were made under the ice.
Summer of 1947. USS Boarfish (SS-327) conducted the first extended under-ice dives, covering a distance of about 30 miles during three dives in the Chuckchi Sea in the Arctic.
Summer of 1948. USS Carp (SS-338) in the Chuckchi Sea, experimented with methods of diving and surfacing in the ice.
August-September 1952. USS Redfish (SS-395) in Beaufort Sea. (Joint exploration with Canada.)
August-September 1957. USS Nautilus (SSN- 571) conducted under-ice operations in the Greenland Sea and Arctic Ocean, spending five and one-half days and proceeding 1,383 miles under the ice pack to within 180 miles of North Pole, farthest North for any ship. USS Trigger proceeded under the edge of the pack.
August 1958. Nautilus submerged in the Bering Strait off Alaska and four days later surfaced in the vicinity of Iceland. Practically parallel with Nautilus' west to east transit of the Arctic Basin was USS Skate's 12- day exploratory cruise under the Arctic ice to the North Pole in the same month. Skate entered and left the pack in the eastern Arctic.
March 1959. Skate made a second trip, but this time in the dead of winter. This cruise was significant in proving the feasibility of surfacing through the winter ice.
March 1959. USS Harder and USS Trout penetrated winter pack ice near Newfoundland and traveled 280 miles each beneath the ice, surfacing in polynyas to recharge batteries. The 280-mile distances were records for conventionally-powered submarines.
February 1960. USS Sargo made the first entry to and exit from the western approaches of the Arctic Basin. Her trip was made in mid-winter, the most difficult time of the year for Arctic transits.
August 1960. USS Seadragon transited the Northwest Passage and proceeded to the North Pole, making the first east-west transit of the Arctic Basin.
Seapower: The Soviet Navy has increased from a total tonnage in 1940 of 600,000 to
1.600.0 tons today, which makes it the most powerful fleet in the world after the United States (4 million tons). The Royal Navy, with
750.0 tons, ranks third. (The Communist Bloc and the Free World.)
Piccard Plans New Craft: Jacques Piccard, young member of the Swiss family Piccard, who have gone higher in the sky and lower in the ocean than almost any other human beings, was in New York yesterday with an idea for a new kind of undersea craft.
Just a year ago Mr. Piccard, who is 38, and a Navy lieutenant went deeper in the ocean than anyone had been before—35,800 feet to the bottom of the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench off Guam in the Pacific. They went down in the Trieste, an undersea craft called a bathyscaph which Mr. Piccard built with the help of his father, Auguste Piccard.
Auguste Piccard at one time held the deep- sea diving record. He and his twin brother, Jean Piccard, also pioneered in balloon ascents into the stratosphere.
No spot in any ocean is believed to be deeper than the Challenger Deep and thus Jacques Piccard has no further incentive for deep-diving records. As a result, he said yesterday, he has been designing at his home in Lausanne, Switzerland, a more maneuverable and useful undersea craft.
The Trieste, he explained, consists of two structures, a sphere and a tank. The sphere contains steel ballast and room for two passengers; the tank, gasoline. The Trieste goes down because the ballast makes it heavier than water. It comes up because the ballast is released and the gasoline is lighter than water. It has a small propeller for limited sideways motion.
The new craft would be something like an underwater helicopter and would be called a mesocaph, he said. It would consist only of a sphere about ten feet in diameter, which would be lighter than water. It would be sent downwards by vertical propellers which would also allow it to hover at various depths. Horizontal propellers would send it sideways.
The mesocaph would have sides about a third as thick as the bathyscaph and would be designed to work at depths of only about
5,0 feet, he said.
Mr. Piccard said the new boat will cost about $500,000, about the same as the bathyscaph. He now is seeking these funds and indicated yesterday that he may suggest to the Navy that it sponsor the construction. (William G. Wing in the New York Herald Tribune, 4 February 1961.)
Dutch Print Ration Cards: Ration cards have been printed and stored in various parts of Holland and a food distribution system worked out against the possibility of war, Lieutenant General T. E. Mathon, Dutch civil defense chief of staff, has said in a speech here.
Stores of coal, salt, and oil also are being laid down to meet an emergency, he added. {Christian Science Monitor, 1 February 1961.)
Sweden Planning Six Submarines: Neutral Sweden will build six new long-range submarines and spend $10,400,000 on guided missiles in 1961-62 under a record $3,300,000,000 budget submitted to Parliament recently.
The submarines will not be atomic- powered, but will be capable of underwater runs of long duration. The Navy also will get six torpedo-boats, faster and larger than earlier types. (New York Herald Tribune, 13 January 1961).
Cloud Seeding: Two scientists at Illinois Institute of Technology, Dr. L. F. Mondolfo and Dr. B. E. Sundquist, working on an unrelated problem in metallurgy under a National Science Foundation grant, discovered that the generally accepted scientific explanation for silver iodide cloud seeding—known popularly as rain making—is not correct.
Before water vapor floating in the atmosphere can precipitate, it must first be transformed into ice. The two Illinois Tech scientists found that rainmakers have been using the right substance for this transformation, but for the wrong reason.
Scientists have generally accepted in the past that because silver iodide’s crystal structure is similar to ice, it provided a good nucleus around which the solidifying ice could form. According to Mondolfo and Sundquist, silver iodide serves as a good nucleus because its surface energy is higher than ice, not because of similar crystal structure. Therefore, the material to be nucleated (ice), has a surface energy lower than the nucleus (silver iodide), and will form a coating on it.
A liquid or vapor can be subjected to temperatures below the freezing point, but will not solidify unless a nucleus is present upon which the solid can form. For example, water in large amounts is found in the atmosphere at temperatures as low as —40 degrees Fahrenheit, and when seeded with silver iodide, it immediately freezes and precipitates.
The research of the two scientists theorized that the similarity of crystal structure is not at all important. Working with metals in their study of “Heterogeneous Nucleation in Liquid Metals,” they found in all cases that where one metal could act as a nucleus for another metal, the reverse is impossible. For example, according to Mondolfo, “Tin will act as a very good nucleus for lead, but will not act as a nucleus for tin at all.”
Because of the success achieved in the research project at IIT, the National Science Foundation has granted another award of $26,400, for three years of further study. The research is directed at the determination of the factors that control the nucleation, and the establishment of a theory of nucleation to replace the discarded one. (Midwest Engineer, January 1961.)
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Danube Traffic: There is nothing blue or beautiful about the Danube River as it swings south and east through the upper corner of Yugoslavia. It is simply an enormous channel for merchandise, on whose leisurely flowing but muddy waters tugs and barges chug busily.
Last year more than 17,000,000 tons of goods, both national and international traffic, were transported on the Danube. Most of it was bulk cargo such as coal, ores, timber, crude oil, building material, wheat and metallurgical products.
Impressive as this figure is compared with ten years ago, when, because of the political situation, international traffic on the 1,725- mile artery was down to a trickle, it is far under the totals envisioned for the coming years.
The eight Danube nations—Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary, Rumania, Czechoslovakia, the Soviet Union, West Germany and Yugoslavia—are now drawing up plans for projects that should provide unhampered navigation along the entire river to above Regensburg, in West Germany.
Here, near Kelheim, will be the southern end of the projected Rhine-Danube canal. This vast project will carry barges of up to 1,500 tons over the mountains between the valleys of the Danube and the Main Rivers and will provide an all-water route across Europe from the Black to the North Seas.
Work on the Rhine-Danube canal and the connecting rivers has been completed to the vicinity of Nuremberg. The entire project is expected to be completed within the next two or three years.
Even without this link to the industrial centers of Western Europe, the Danube countries expect a large increase in their traffic. An indication of the anticipated growth is provided by the Yugoslav figures. In 1959, 2,330,000 tons of cargo were handled by Yugoslav river ports. This year the Yugoslav tonnage is expected to rise to more than 5,000,000 tons, about 4,000,000 of which would be internal trade.
By 1963, the Yugoslav total is expected to be more than 9,000,000 tons, an increase of nearly 400 per cent over the 1959 figure.
The projected increase is a measure of the rise in industrialization in Eastern Europe and the improvement in the political climate. International navigation on the Danube is controlled by a seven-nation commission, representing all the riparian states except West Germany, under the provisions of the Communist-dictated 1948 Danube Convention.
Although the Danube is the only major navigable European river that flows from west to east, its traffic has never developed to an extent commensurate with its geographical position. With the postwar consolidation of Communist power in Eastern Europe and the struggle between the Moscow bloc and Yugoslavia that began in 1948, the greater part of the traffic that had been developed was cut off.
In 1952, Soviet occupation forces in Austria lifted their restrictions on river traffic on that section of the Danube. However, it was not until 1954 that Yugoslavia’s relations with the Soviet bloc had improved sufficiently for navigation on the lower part of the river to flow more or less normally.
Since then, traffic has risen steadily as the Danube states developed their mutual trade. This trend was capped this month by a meeting of the Danube Commission. Basic agreement was reached on the first stage of river improvement projects for the next five years. All projects are aimed at an increase in the minimum depth of the river to accommodate larger craft and more traffic. (New York Times, 12 February 1961.)
Russian Aid to Morocco: A shipment of 16 MIG fighter planes, the first Russian military aid to Morocco, has arrived in Casablanca aboard a Soviet freighter.
The shipment coincided with the visit of Soviet President Leonid I. Brezhnev, who is in Morocco on an African visit. He will go on tomorrow for a five-day visit to Guinea after two days in Casablanca.
Moroccan government officials said only that a shipment of MiG’s was in Morocco.
It was learned, however, that the Soviet freighter had put into Casablanca harbor, and that 16 huge crates had been unloaded under tight police and military guard. It still could not be learned whether the planes were of an old or the latest type. (Baltimore Sun, 11 February 1961.)
Civil War Sinking: A diary containing an eyewitness account of the Civil War naval battle between the Kearsarge and the Alabama off Cherbourg, France, has come to light in New York.
The diary was kept by William Wainright, an officer aboard the Kearsarge. It was found recently by his great-grandnephew. The battle occurred on 19 June 1864. The Kearsarge, a Union sloop, was engaged by the gunboat, Alabama, a noted Confederate raider, a few days after the Alabama had put into Cherbourg for repairs. The Yankee gunners sunk the Confederate vessel quickly—or, in Wain- right’s precise notes, in exactly one hour and two minutes.
Wainright, whose grammar apparently did not match his naval prowess, wrote that after the Kearsarge had sighted the enemy vessel, “we allowed him to fire away for some time, never taking any notice of him.” He continued:
“As soon .as we was in the right place, the captain gave the order to bring the rifle gun to bear on him. It was done before he got the words out of his mouth, and it was no sooner brought to bear on him than we sent him our compliments in the shape of an eighty- pound shell.
“ . . . He [the Alabama] began to fire quite fast, firing two to three to our one, but none of his shot took effect. We had been engaged for about a half an hour when two of our men got wounded, but none of his shot took effect.
“About a quarter of twelve one of our eleven-inch shells carried away his rudder, so we had him at our mercy. It was just after the shot that carried away her rudder that one of our eleven-inch shells entered her side just below the waterline and exploded just as it entered.
“It raised the very Devil aboard her, smashing her coal bunkers, throwing the coal into the fire room so that the firemen were compelled to seek safety in flight. She began to sink fast after this shot entered her and still they would not give up and her fire began to slack off and as she lay helpless in the water we put shot and shell into her right and left without any return.
“At exactly two minutes past twelve she hauled her flag down—yes, the far-famed Alabama who was thought to be the invincible, surrendered to the U.S.S. Kearsarge after an engagement of an hour and two minutes.”
Wainright told how the ship had gone down stern first and how the Kearsarge and an “English steam yacht” had picked up the survivors.
“I was glad to see her go down,” he said, “and still I felt sorry for the poor fellows.” (Richard H. Parke in New York Times, 7 February 1961.)
Can Travel on Air Bubble or Dive: A new
vehicle can slide over land or sea on a cushion of air. An engineer in the Bureau of Naval Weapons has now designed one to dip below the surface and become a submarine.
The inventor, Robert W. Pinnes, believes his amphibious machine will be useful for antisubmarine warfare, as it can get around above the surface faster than a submarine travels and can submerge to attack.
The patent specifications cover a watertight boat hull combined with a body suited to operations above the surface. When it is hovering over the water, air is drawn through a duct at the top and forced down through a circular jet against the sea. The vehicle rides on a large air bubble.
To submerge, the operator shuts off the duct and its fan, opens the water tank and transfers the power to a water propeller. The tank can be emptied to raise the vehicle again.
The Department of Defense has been experimenting with simpler ground-effect machines that move a few inches above the ground. Mr. Pinnes has given the government aTree license to use his design, but none has yet been built. “So far, it’s all on paper,” he said the other day.
According to the inventor, nuclear energy appears effective as a source of power for his submersible vehicle. “When desired,” the patent explains, “the machine could surface and operate as a surface vessel or rise out of the water and operate as a conventional ground-effect machine. Thus, in a single vehicle the present invention provides the characteristics of a submarine, a surface ship, and an aircraft, a concept that has, to date, been considered impracticable.” (Stacy V. Jones in The New York Times, 28 January 1961).
Turbine Patrol Boat: The prototype of a new fast turbine patrol boat built as a private venture by Vosper, Limited, Portsmouth, England, has just been completed.
By virtue of their size, the “Brave”-class patrol boats are rather expensive, and due to changes of armament specifications, Vosper has now designed this 88-foot patrol boat, using only two Proteus gas turbine engines with a view to placing on the market a boat which might come within the range of meeting the same requirements for less cost. Due to the reduced hull dimensions and the fact that Bristol Siddeley Engines, Limited, have up-rated their Proteus Gas Turbines to 4,250 brake horsepower, a speed of over 50 knots has been achieved. For long patrols at low speed there are two Mathway/Daimler cruising and maneuvering diesel engines in addition to the main propulsion machinery.
This new 88-foot craft, named Ferocity, has a beam of 22 feet and an average displacement of 75-85 tons. The range on main engines at 45 knots is 400 nautical miles, and on auxiliary engines cruising at 9-10 knots, 2,000 nautical miles.
The construction of the main hull is of mahogany, Canadian rock elm, and marine plywood, bonded throughout with Rescor- cinol or Phenolic adhesive, completely eliminating fastenings. The superstructure is of welded aluminium alloy with air intake cowling of riveted aluminium alloy. The shafting is of monel metal with propellers shrunk on without the usual key which tends to reduce strength in the shaft. In this way a smaller shaft for given torque can be used. A comparatively high speed of revolution leads to small propeller and appendages. The propulsion arrangements are the result of an exhaustive study in the Vosper cavitation tunnel.
Exhaust is through the upper portion of transom, protected by a shelf. Adjustable hinged flaps are fitted to protect the exhaust outlet in the event of one turbine being stopped. A very high degree of maneuverability is achieved, using twin rudders and Mathway power-assisted steering gear, incorporating a two-speed box enabling emergency hand use. In addition, as an optional extra, automatic steering can be incorporated, and the Ferocity is fitted with the Sperry Tiller Pilot.
These craft are designed for both offensive and defensive operations in coastal waters, and are the most modern and advanced warships of their type. (Reed's Marine Equipment News, December 1960.)
Germans to Sell 15 Subs: West Germany and Norway have signed an agreement on mutual purchase of defense equipment under which Norway will buy 15 small submarines from West Germany. (Christian Science Monitor, 17 December I960.)
Subs To Be in Norfolk: The nuclear attack submarine Shark now being completed at Newport News, will be based in Norfolk along with the sister submarine Scorpion.
The Shark will be commissioned at Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company 9 February and after fitting out will be assigned to Submarine Squadron 6.
Assignment to Norfolk of the Scorpion, now based at New London, may not come for a couple of months, an Atlantic Fleet Submarine Force spokesman said.
Both nuclear subs are of the Skipjack-class of hunter-killer ships with the whale-like hull design. They are built primarily for antisubmarine operations and equipped with six forward torpedo tubes.
The submarines are 252 feet long, have a 32-foot beam and are rated at 2,850 tons. While submerged they displace 3,500 tons. Although their speed and diving abilities are secret, the Navy acknowledges they will go faster than 20 knots and to depths below 400 feet.
The submarine tender Orion, flagship for Submarine Squadron 6, is at Philadelphia Naval Shipyard undergoing modernization. She is due to return to Norfolk late in February.
Part of the Orion’s modernization will enable her to support the nuclear submarines.
Assignment of the Shark and the Scorpion to Norfolk will mark the beginning of the nuclear ship age for world’s largest naval base. Other atomic subs are likely to be assigned here, but not the Polaris, or Fleet ballistic missile type.
Charleston and New London will continue to be the operation and support bases for Polaris subs. As the missile fleet grows, however, Norfolk probably will become a major base for the atomic hunter-killer submersibles.
Norfolk also is expected to get the Navy’s first group of surface nuclear ships. These at present are the carrier Enterprise, the cruiser Long Beach and the frigate Bainbridge.
Future construction of atomic-powered surface ships will depend largely on the performance of the first three. All are costly and development of a “Nuclear task force” will have to await results, Navy sources say. (Richard M. Mansfield in the Norjolk Virginian-Pilot, 31 January 1961.)
RAN Program: Australia has had second thoughts about closing down naval aviation and otherwise reducing the Royal Australian Navy, and has become much more alive to the importance of maritime defense in SouthEast Asian and Australasian waters.
It may be recalled that it was announced at the end of last year by the Australian Minister for Defense that special emphasis in Royal Australian Navy policy would be on antisubmarine defense and that the Australian Cabinet had decided to disband the Fleet Air Arm by 1963 when its existing aircraft would reach the end of their service life because more and • larger aircraft would call for a larger aircraft carrier, the cost of which would be prohibitive.
But now the Australian Minister for the Navy has told the Senate that antisubmarine helicopters will be purchased for the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne (formerly the aircraft carrier named Majestic) from the Royal Navy, which would remain in commission after 1963 as an antisubmarine helicopter carrier instead of being retired to the mothball fleet.
In addition, details have been announced in Canberra of a new Australian naval program for the purchase of six modern minesweepers, a survey ship, and possibly a number of extra antisubmarine helicopters if a firm price were obtained.
The Royal Australian Navy will acquire four of the minesweepers to be purchased in Great Britain, and they would then be modified to suit Australian conditions.
The remaining two minesweepers will probably be constructed in Australia’s own shipyards if the prices and delivery dates are comparable with those obtaining in overseas shipbuilding yards.
The new surveying vessel, which will have a displacement of approximately 2,000 tons, will be built in Australia.
Four new fast antisubmarine frigates are being built in Australia; and the Royal Australian Navy is studying the possibility of establishing an Australian submarine force. Three or four modern submarines costing between £3,000,000 and £4,000,000 each will be purchased from Great Britain for the Royal Australian Navy. {The Navy, December 1960).
Collapsible Boat: A collapsible rubber boat, 60 feet long with a 27-foot beam, believed to be the longest rubber craft ever built, has been launched in the Mediterranean by the famed oceanographer, Commander Jacques Yves-Cousteau.
The boat, called the Amphitrite, was built specially to carry Cousteau’s “diving saucer,” a globe-shaped craft destined to explore the sea down to 1,000 feet.
After initial tests in the Mediterranean, the Amphitrite will be deflated, wrapped and put aboard a plane to be flown, with the diving saucer, to the Indian Ocean in February. Later, in the summer, both rubber boat and diving saucer will go north of Greenland to the Arctic ice cap.
Displacing 6 tons and capable of carrying 20 tons, the Amphitrite is propelled by eight ordinary 80-horsepower outboard motors. Eventually, two diesel engines will replace the outboard motors and drive pumps for hydrojet propulsions.
This huge rubber boat is fast. She can travel at speeds of up to 35 knots and is very maneuverable.
Another unusual feature is that she sits in the water like a duck. Even when fully loaded with a 20-ton cargo, the boat’s rubber hull sinks no more than 14 inches beneath the surface.
Of exceptional stability, the boat can navigate in stormy weather or ordinarily dangerous seas without risk, and Cousteau feels certain that the Amphitrite could cross the Atlantic without difficulty.
A crew of three men can handle the boat, but she has accommodations for eight.
Cousteau, director of Monaco’s Museum of Oceanography and who was a pioneer of underwater exploration and invented the aqualung, considers the boat “revolutionary.” The credit for its design belongs to his associate, Commander Jean Alinat.
Cousteau believes that in a few years the principle of the Amphitrite will be used to construct rubber vessels, first of 300 tons and later of up to 3,000 tons.
“Imagine a petroleum tanker built on this model,” he says. “It could transport enormous cargoes with very small crews and, empty, could speed home at 50 knots.” (Baltimore Sun, 21 January 1961.) 957 Active Vessels: There were 957 ships of 1,000 gross tons or more in this country’s active merchant marine on 1 January, according to the Maritime Administration. This represents an increase of 18 in the fleet over a year ago and 17 over last month.
The total fleet of government-owned ships on 1 January consisted of 2,038 ships, of which 2,004 were laid up in reserve fleet anchorages. The total privately owned fleet consisted of 1,008 ships, of which 85 were in lay-up. There were 34 active government ships and 923 private ones.
A breakdown of the idle private tonnage showed that 76 ships were laid up for lack of employment and nine were undergoing repairs or conversion. The 76 unemployed ships included 33 dry-cargo ships, three passenger-cargo ships, and 40 tankers.
During the last year, the federal shipping agency reported there was a drop of 32 vessels in the nation’s total fleet. This fleet of active and inactive government and privately owned vessels numbered 3,078 on 1 January 1960 and 3,046 on 1 January 1961. (New York Times, 24 January 1961.)
Defense Studied by New Zealand: The new
government of New Zealand is reviewing its defense forces to determine the country’s capacity to meet its commitments to its allies.
One of the first acts of the National party government after it had ousted the Labor regime in the general election 26 November was to order an intensive study of the defense outlook. A major policy statement is expected in about two months.
New Zealand is committed to co-operation in defense with the United States and Australia through the ANZUS treaty with the United States and six other nations through the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization.
New Zealand’s role, it is generally understood, is to make available small but efficient forces that would be able to arrive quickly on the scene in the event of an emergency in the Pacific.
In recent years New Zealand has constantly maintained one or more warships and air units in the Southeast Asian theater. It has an infantry battalion based in Malaya, ready for front-line service. (New York Times, 8 January 1961.)
Oil for Western Defense: The French Ministry of Industry and Commerce has strengthened the Western defense posture by constructing a double submarine pipeline to supply reserve oil tanks on the Normandy coast near Le Havre. Anchored offshore, the biggest modern tankers discharge oil directly into the two pipes which, branching together, run more than a mile underwater, then carry the oil up to a relay pumping station on top of the 360-foot cliff above the beach. (France Actuelle, February 1961.)
Steady Light for 86 Years: Mariners steaming in the vicinity of latitude 37-55 North and longitude 74-56 West in 13 fathoms of water after 1 February will find an old friend missing from the horizon.
Gone will be the two pole-like masts, the forward one 66 feet above the water, supporting a lantern with many thousands of candle- power which would wink 14 miles out to sea.
Gone will.be the mournful-sounding dia- phone and the never-failing radio beacon. All have been a part of the red-hulled vessels which have served so ably as the Coast Guard’s Winter Quarter Shoal Lightship Station, abandoned in favor of more efficient aids to mariners 1 February.
In her 86 years of service to the men who ply the waters off the Eastern Shore, the Winter Quarter Station vessels have performed their day-to-day, year-to-year chores apparently without the hazards and perils that have plagued other lightships.
The crew of the vessel that was manning the Diamond Shoals Station did not soon forget 8 August 1918, when a surfaced German submarine opened fire on the vessel with her deck gun. The station ship caught fire and her crew took to a whaleboat and watched her burn from shore.
The successor to this famed vessel faced another peril—the weather—15 years later when a howling hurricane tossed the sturdy little vessel into the breakers off the southwest point of the outer shoals.
Some lightships have had a certain moth- to-flame attraction about them. Ships’ masters have been known to steer for the beckoning light atop a station vessel. The result has often been disastrous.
One such ship was the White Star Lines’
Olympic, which knifed through Nantucket Station Vessel 117 on 15 May 1934. Four crewmen of the vessel were lost.
Another collision, involving again a Diamond Shoals Station vessel, fortunately did not cause loss of life. On 20 July 1944, the lightship was riding chained to a mooring buoy when a tug, with barges in tow, passed too close aboard. The tug cut into the lightship, sinking her.
Overfalls Lightship at the entrance to Delaware Bay will also have its familiar light extinguished—for a year, anyway. Filling the gap will be the new Delaware Station Lightship, 30 miles southeast of the bay’s mouth, and a more powerful Assateague Lighthouse, a light of 1.8-million candle- power. (Ed Frede in the Norfolk Virginian- Pilot, 26 January 1961.)
Suez Depth Increased: The American Eastern Corporation, 10 Rockefeller Plaza, announced that the Suez Canal Authority will permit vessels that have been transiting the Suez Canal at 35-foot drafts to increase their draft to 36 feet beginning 15 February. American Eastern acts as agent for the Suez Canal in this country.
The one-half foot draft increase will enable tankers to increase their cargoes at Persian Gulf ports by thousands of gallons. (New York Herald Tribune, 7 February 1961.)
HMS Puma: The Admiralty has announced a generous grant of salvage-money to the ship’s company of the Royal Navy frigate Puma. Puma, in company with the aircraft carricr-Bulwark, assisted in the salvaging of two tankers which collided and were abandoned off Arabia about two years ago.
The two warships concerned were awarded £100,000 salvage money, which will be distributed to their crews. The actual sum paid to each individual is according to rank; in this case the minimum will be about £23 for junior ratings.
Since this salvage feat Puma has gone home to recommission, and has rejoined the South Atlantic station. It is doubtful if there are any sailors from the previous commission still serving in her and thus able to spend their salvage money on a good run ashore in the Cape. (Commando, November 1960.)
Satellite Project: Eighty delegates from 12 Western European nations have begun discussion of a plan to put into orbit a jointly made satellite. The conference, held in private, had before it a project for a pool to develop launcher rockets.
The delegates represented Britain and France, the co-sponsors, West Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, and Spain. Observers were present from Ireland, Canada, Greece, and Turkey. (New York Herald Tribune, 1 February 1961.)
Sidewinders for the Royal Navy: Scimitars of the Royal Navy are to be armed with Sidewinder infra-red, air-to-air missiles in place of their current armament, which is four 30-mm. Aden cannon and 48 unguided air- to-air rockets. The Admiralty states that its order for Aden ammunition has been cancelled and that the money saved will reduce expenditure on Sidewinders.
Sidewinders are to be installed in the Scimitar, rather than de Havilland Fire- streaks, because they are cheaper and because there is insufficient space in the aircraft to install the A. I. radar and fire-control equipment necessary to make the best use of the Firestreak’s high performance. (The Aeroplane and Astronautics, 25 November 1960.)
French Deterrent: On 6 December the French National Assembly endorsed a five- year program to create an independent nuclear force. This includes the development of atomic and hydrogen bombs, the production of 50 Mirage-4 bombers, and missile research. (The Aeroplane and Astronautics, 16 December 1960.)
Munich Institute for the Study of the U.S.S.R.:
On 8 July 1950 a group of eight emigre scholars from the Soviet Union met in Munich and organized the Institute for the Study of the Culture and History of the U.S.S.R., later renamed the Institute for the Study of the U.S.S.R. In December of the same year the Institute was incorporated as a German academic corporation.
The basic aim of the Institute at the time of its founding was to conduct research into the theory and practice of various aspects of the state and social order of the U.S.S.R. and the problems of its constituent peoples. The program was to be carried out by building up a library, developing a staff, conducting reresearch studies, maintaining contact with other scholarly organizations, holding conferences, and preparing and distributing publications—all for the purpose of providing the non-Soviet world, and to the extent possible the Soviet world as well, with reliable information on Soviet developments.
By the time of its tenth anniversary, in July 1960, it had developed into a firmly established research institution. As it grew in size, the membership was increased to the present 46, and a Learned Council was created to guide the scholarly activities.
The principal aims and activities of the Institute have remained those set forth by its founders, but the scope of the work has vastly increased. During its ten years’ history, the Institute has located and trained a staff of 70 persons, chiefly emigres whose first-hand knowledge of life in the U.S.S.R., together with long acquaintance with the languages and source materials of the area studied, make them unusually qualified for research in this field. The resident staff is supplemented by several hundred emigre scholar contributors throughout the non-Soviet world.
(Soviet Affairs Intelligence, 15 November 1960.)
Sea Water Filter: A Russian ship in the Black Sea is now using regularly a system which makes sea water drinkable.
The sea water is filtered through an ap~ paratus containing polymer fibres, which remove all impurities including salt. It can convert about 110 gallons of sea water an hour to drinking water. About one-quarter of a pound of filtering material is required to purify each gallon of water.
These filters, known as “ionite” filters, can also be used for purifying industrial effluent and for the extraction of gold, silver, nickel and copper in suspension in water. (Merchant Navy Journal, October-December 1960.)
Oceanographic Data Center: A new National Oceanographic Data Center will act as a clearing house, acquiring, compiling, processing, and preserving oceanographic data. The information thus made centrally available will be used: (1) in the development and improvement of oceanographic prediction techniques, such as fishing population forecasts and ship routing forecasts; (2) in basic research investigations, such as studies of the Gulf Stream, hurricane research, and fishing mortality problems; (3) in the preparation of new oceanographic atlases, which will provide a better and more complete understanding of the marine environment; and (4) planning of future oceanographic surveys.
The Interagency Committee on Oceanography provided the co-ordinated planning which resulted in this new facility.
Participating government agencies include the Navy Department, U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, National Science Foundation, Atomic Energy Commission, and the Weather Bureau. The joint activity will be administered by the Hydrographer of the Navy, Rear Admiral Edward C. Stephan, U. S. Navy. Costs will be shared by the agencies.
The nucleus of data with which the new center begins its work is being transferred from the Navy Hydrographic Office files. It consists of more than 20 million machine punch cards which contain oceanographic observations. Several types of reports are available on photocards, in data logs and other forms. They may be referred to free of charge at the reference library or can be procured in the form of listings, summaries, tabulations or microfilm at standard costs.
A prime responsibility of the center is the prompt distribution to collecting agencies of the results of oceanographic surveys. The Indian Ocean expedition, now underway, is the first large scale oceanographic expedition scheduled to be processed by the data center as observations come in from the survey ships.
Netherlands Gets Trackers: The Royal Canadian Navy transferred the first five of a total of 17 Tracker ASW aircraft to The Netherlands under terms of mutual aid to member nations of NATO. The aircraft are built by the de Havilland Aircraft of Canada, Ltd., under license from Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corp. (Aviation Week, 19 December 1960.)
Leningrad Open: For the first time in history, ships are arriving and departing from the Port of Leningrad in the middle of the winter, according to Moscow Radio.
The broadcast explained this was due to two factors: The winter has been unusually mild thus far and the growing Soviet icebreaker fleet is able to keep channels open in the Gulf of Finland and the Neva River. (Baltimore Sun, 4 February 1961.)
Adapters for shipboard receptacle—-to provide grounded circuit.
BuShips Dwg. 815-F-1197085 Symbol 2440—15A 125V
Melrose 76, Massachusetts
2440.1 10A 125V