p. 8 | THE SUBMARINE MINE by T.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 7, 1898

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 24, No. 14.

THE SUBMARINE MINE.

By T.

In these days of so much war talk frequent mention is made of the submarine mine, designed to blow up the enemy’s ship. Our illustrations give an idea of what the mine is and how by an electric wire it is exploded from the shore. The harbors in which these mines are placed are carefully mapped, and the exact location where the mine is anchored is recorded. It is let down from the side of a ship, the anchor to which the mine is attached sinking it to the bottom and holding it there.

A vessel does not have to be directly over the mine in order for it to be destroyed by the explosion. Mr. Hudson Maxim, in the Journal of the Military Service Institution, gives the distances at which some of the various high explosives would destroy a man-of-war, as follows:—

“Five hundred pounds of gun cotton will be fatal at a distance of about 38 feet; maximite and picric acid, about 47 feet; nitro-gelatin, about 54 feet; one-half ton of gun cotton, about 85 feet; one ton of gun cotton, 168 feet; while a ton of nitro-gelatin would be fatal at 250 feet.”

Something of the power that may be wrapped up in the small compass of the submarine mine can be gathered from these figures. And every fresh evidence shown in the warlike preparations of the world should be an additional incentive to lead us to work all the more diligently in presenting the glad news that Jesus is soon to come and end this strife. T.