NO STEEL ALLOWED

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22419, 4 June 1938, Page 19

NO STEEL ALLOWED

Non-Magnetic Research Vessel

IN a quiet reach of the river Dark, Devon, a £IOO,OOO sailing-ship is being built, which will set out next year as a floating research station, writes the London correspondent of “The Press.” The Royal Research Ship, Research, which is being constructed for the Admiralty by Philip and Son, a Devon firm, which has made ships and yachts through three generations, is tp conduct surveys in magnetic variation, and will in consequence be constructed almost entirely of material. The hull will be made of teak, and the framework, girders and fittings, which on an ordinary ship would be of steel or iron, will be of bronze or other non-jnagnetic alloys. The anchor, cables, and all the bolts will be of bronze, and even the cooking equipment must have no steel or iron in its composition. Nor must any member of the crew carry a steel pen-knife. The Research will be brigantinerigged and will cruise mostly under sail, but she will be fitted with an auxiliary heavy oil motor. Her displacement will be 650 tons and she

will carry enough fuel to give her a cruising radius of 2000 miles at a speed of six knots. Her complement will be 31, including officers and scientific staff. The frame of the ship is expected to be complete early in May, and the launching is planned for the spring of next year. The Research will carry on the work of the Carnegie, a vessel of somewhat similar type, which was destroyed by an explosion off Samoa in 1929 after 25 years’ magnetic survey work, the results of which were placed at the disposal of all Governments. The Carnegie Institution, of Washington, which controlled the Carnegie, lent the services of her former commander, Mr W. J. Peters, to the Admiralty, where he has advised on the design and equipment of the Research. The programme of work for the new vessel includes research on the earth’s magnetism at sea, investigation of atmospheric electricity, meteorological observations, including upper air observations, by means of pilot balloons, deep-sea soundings, and possibly marine biology.