Great Lakes Art Database

Marine Review (Cleveland, OH), September 1914, p. 361

The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

September, 1914 stokehole through the full area of the bunker doorway; while the engineer on duty in the after boiler room noticed water pouring in in large volume out of the forward bunker door on the starboard side almost immediately after the shock of the impact was felt. From these facts it is clear that the Empress of Ireland was damaged in the immediate vicinity of the watertight bulkhead fitted between the two boiler rooms, while the stem of the Storstad must have penetrated into the side of the Empress of Ireland sufficiently far to reach the door of the cabin be- fore mentioned. This door was 16 fees abaft the bulkhead, the watertightness of which was destroyed. Effect of the Collision on the Stability of the Empress of Ireland Just before the collision, the mean draft of the vessel was 2/7 feet; she was carrying 1,160 tons of cargo, 2,300 tons of coal, and all the double bottom tanks were filled with either fresh or salt water. Her metacentric height under these circumstances was just over 40 inches, and with all port holes closed her stability at large angles of keel was ample. The immediate effect of the damage referred to above was to destroy the watertightness of the bulkhead dividing the two boiler rooms, and to place these compartments (with a combined length of 175 feet) in communictaion with the sea. From an examination of the dam- age done to the bow of the Storstad it has been estimated that the area of the hole made in the side of Empress of Ireland was sufficient to allow an initial inflow of water into the vessel of 265 tons per second, supposing such inflow unobstructed. Coal and other obstruc- tions would lessen this rate, but it is certain that in a very short time both boiler rooms would be entirely flooded up to the water level outside, as from the evidence is known to have been the case. Flooding these compartments in- volved a mean sinkage of practically 9 feet, and assuming, in the first place, that the water as it rose in these com- partments was symmetrically distributed with reference to the middle line of the ship, this sinkage would take the main deck 4 feet below the water at amidships, anid this deck would be be- low water throughout its length except for a comparatively short portion for- ward. Under these conditions of dam- age the ship would still have had a Metacentric height of just over two feet, and would have continued to float upright had the watertight doors in bulkheads above the main deck bound- ing the damage length been closed. Under the actual conditions prevailing THE MARINE REVIEW at the time of the collision, however, with the side of the vessel, where struck open to the sea above the main deck, and with bulkhead doors on the star- board side of that deck open, water could find its way freely over that deck, thus wholly destroying the ves- sel's stability and causing her to cap- size and founder. For convenience of description it has been assumed in the foregoing that the entering water was distributed symme- trically with reference to the middle line of the ship, but initially this was certainly not the case. The Storstad penetrated the starboard side of the Empress of Ireland at the cross coal bunker. fitted between the two boiler rooms, this cross bunker being subdi- vided athwartships by the watertight bulkhead separating the boiler rooms. his bunker was also divided at the middle line of ship, below the lower deck level, by longitudinal watertight or dusttight communication and steam pipe passages, connected by a non-watertight partition. The part of this. cross block which was in the forward boiler room was connected on the starboard side to a longitudinal bunker running to a cross-block at the forward end of that room, this latter being divided below the: lower deck and at the middle line of ship, by a non-watertight longitudinal partition. Very similar arrangements existed abreast the. after boiler room, details of these being given in the por- tion of this report which deals with the construction of the ship. The bun- ker bulkheads of this vessel, in ac- cordance with usual practise, were not watertight. It may be added that the arrangement of coal was_ practically symmetrical with reference to the mid- dle line of ship. There is no evidence that the Storstad destroyed any portion of the bunker bulkheads, so that very shortly after the impact a large quantity of water must have entered the bunkers on the star- board side for the whole length of the boiler rooms, which water was able to escape only through bunker doors into the boiler rooms. and relatively slowly also across the middle line partitions in coal bunkers to the port side of the vessel. Under these circumstances the ship would at onice commence to list to starboard, the precise angle of inclina- tion at any time being dependent upon the actual rate of inflow of water and the rate of its distribution across the ship. In the absence of this informa- tion a close estimate of the list is not possible; but making reasonable ap- proximations an inclination of some 15 to 20 degrees appears probable under these circumstances. From such a list the vessel might have recovered as the water got to the port side, if all port é 361 holes, and all watertight doors in bulk- heads bounding the boiler compartments up to upper deck, had been closed; but with doors and _sidelights open to the extent known to have obtained after the collision, water was free to enter other compartments and the final capsizing and foundering became inevitable. Thus, summarizing the foregoing, it will be seen that while the entry of water on the starboard side naturally induced a tendency to heel to that side, the heeling effect was increased by the fact that the bunker bulkheads retarded the free flow of water across the ship. Very shortly after the collision the vessel must, for this reason, have listed to a considerable angle, and this, com- bined with the bodily sinkage of the vessel, would speedily immerse the side ports known to be open between main and upper decks. As the sinkage, due to the entry of water through the injured side and through the port holes, con- tinued, water would, under the actual circumstances existing at the time of the collision, obtain free access to the main dock, with the results already in- dicated. Bolinders 'Cua Oil Engine Messrs. J. & C. G. Bolinders Co. Stockholm, Sweden, manufacturers of Rundlof's patent crude oil engines have, in twenty years' development of this engine, succeeded in selling many thou- sand horsepower in the several countries of the world both in marine and sta- tionary types. Realizing the great possibilities of industrial development in the United States after a thorough study of con- ditions by their managing director Mr. Carl Pape of Berlin, they have ar- ranged an American company viz. The Bolinders Co., 30 Church street, New York, and are entering into an active campaign for business in the United States. Mr. W. R. Haynie is manager of the American company. The distinctive features of this engine are very attractive in that it is a 2- cycle engine without valves and is of the simplest possible design and in the case of the marine engine it is direct reversible without gears or supplemen- tary devices. The oil tank steamer Kanawha was launched on July 12 from the Mare [sland navy yard. This vessel, which is designed for fueling ships of the United States navy, is 475 feet over all, 455 feet long, 56 feet beam and 33 feet 11 inches deep. The loaded mean draught is 26 feet 4 inches. She. will have two sets of triple-expansion engines, 23, 3914 and 6814 inches diam- eter by 48-inch stroke supplied with steam from four watertube boilers.

Powered by / Alimenté par VITA Toolkit
Privacy Policy