THE TORPEDO CATCHER

The Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 20, 1879

FromThe Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 54, No. 21

THE TORPEDO CATCHER.

A TRIAL has been made on board the Bloodhound, gunboat, at Portsmouth, England, of a new means for clearing harbors of sunken mines and fixed torpedoes. At present, the method adopted is to destroy the engines by counter-mining or by the hazardous process of “creeping.” This is effected by boats being sent out to grapple for the cable connections, and then severing them by small charges of gun cotton. This mode, however, is very slow. The new method of opening a free channel for the passage of ships, as tried in the Bloodhound, consists in running out a couple of booms, thirty feet in length, from the bows of the ship. Across the submerged ends is fixed a horizontal beam, 38 feet in length, having a zigzag arrangement of iron rods in the form of a W, the idea being that the open space of each V of the series, as it is pushed through the water, will inclose the torpedo fastenings or connections, and lead them to the point at the bottom, which is fitted with a scissor contrivance, the blades of which are worked by levers in connection with the capstan on board. The beam searcher has a sweep of fifty feet, and the mechanism is capable of cutting through the strongest electric cable. A net, which is supported from the whiskers of the bowsprit, receives the liberated torpedo, and prevents it exploding against the operating craft. The trial proved a great success.—Scientific American.