WHALE RESEARCH SHIP

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 73, 19 December 1929, Page 11

WHALE RESEARCH SHIP

V — THE DISCOVERY II

Special interest attaches to the voyage of the research ship Discovery 11., which’ is reported by cable as having sailed from Liverpool on Saturday. The ship was built at Port Glasgow to the order of the Crown Agents for the Colonies. Speaking at the ceremony of launching the ship on November 2, Sir Fortescue Flannery said she was to be the vehicle of a continuation of the research work on the habits of whales in the North seas. In the regions of the North Pole whale fishing had been so extensively and so excessively carried out that whales in those regionos had been practically exterminated. So far as commercial possibilities were concerned, whales had become so few that it was no longer worth while sending out to catch them. It would be a world calamity if the same process were allowed to continue in the ease of whales in the Southern seas, where they still existed in considerable numbers. It would only be by international agreement that the number of whales to be killed would be restricted. He pointed out that while the Discovery was a wooden sailing ship with steam auxiliaries, the present ship was a steamship with sail auxiliaries. The first vessel under favourable condtions attained a speed of eight knots, but the new ' Discovery was designed for a speed of Id Speaking on behalf of the Agents for the Colonies. Mr. H. Horsburgh said they regarded the new vessel as the last word in vessels of that type. It was stated that seven of the membeis of the crew of 50 were with Captain Scott in the Terra Nova, when lost his life in the expedition of 1910-13. Discovery II is 232 ft. in length overall, and has a breadth of 36ft. and draught of 16ft. when fully loaded. Iler stem is cut away at the fore foot and is rabbeted so that the forward edge of the el are protected iu ice navigation, while the shell plating is doubled iu the bow and throughout a belt nt the water line. Special strengthening for resisting ice pressure is given to the hull. She is drnen bv a single propeller actuated by reciprocating engines designed to give a speed of I'l knots. Her furnaces burn oil fuel and her bunkers carry sufficient oil to enable her to steam 6000 miles: at full speed, and at economic speed 9000 miles. Her decks are of steel sheathed with and chemical laboratories’ with instrument and other store rooms are provided on the upper deck. On the lower deck are a dark room and a laboratory. Programme of Investigation. The ship will be employed on an extensive programme of marine investigations, in which a marine biological, station at South Georgia and the R.R.S. M illiam Scoresby, a vessel of the whale-catcher type, also built and equipped tor scientific observations, co-operate. At the biological station whales brought in by one of the whaling companies are subject to scientific examination, and this work, which hns now been proceeding for nearly six years, has resulted in notable additions to our knowledge of the biology of whales. . . , The ultimate object of the work is to discover the reasons of the great seasonal concentrations of whales in Certain parts of the Antarctic, Io truce whale migrations, to find out the causes of the marked annual fluctuations in abundance, to determine the effect of man s operations on the stock of whales, and to apply this knowledge for the benefit of the whaling industry. To carry out this programme Discovery II carries a very lull equipment of the latest pattern of gear and apparatus. . rc , Tbe ship will carry a scientific stalt ot six, eight executive officers, and a surgeon. She is under the scientific leadership of Dr. S. W. Kemp, with Commander W. M. Carey, R-N. (retired), ui executive command.