CUTTING STEEL UNDER WATER

Evening Post, Volume CIII, Issue 129, 3 June 1922, Page 10

CUTTING STEEL UNDER WATER

SUBMERSIBLE FLAME, PROCESS!

Within a very few yards of Westminster Bridge a diver engaged in cutting through ship's' plates with, .an' oxyacetyleno flame,"in;:nine or ten feet of ' water, was watched by an interested crowd. ' A favoured few "actually stood within a few, inchee of the. diver himself,' writes a London correspondent of the Manchester Guardian. It should he explained that this incident did not occur.in the river, but in the experimental department" of a wellknown firm of submarine engineers in the Westminster Bridge-road; and the diver himself was' working inside-a circular tank filled with water. , The .tank is fitted with several plate-glass windows, which allow close examination of what is going on inside, the tank itself being internally illuminated.-' - "-' ' Equipped with a-Siebe-Gorman di,ving.'suit, complete witfr"te^epb.orie apparatus, the diver could be heard-acknowledging an instruction that the "oxy-acetylene .• apparatus was about to be lowered to him.- From above, several attendants were working the\diving apparatus-and i "the above-water end of the telephone, ■where1 a mechanic lit the oxy-acetylene flame from a candle. ,' ' ,' Tliis submersible flame burned with an increasing roar as more , power was turned on, \he roar abruptly ceasing, as the i apparatus dipped below the surface ■to the waiting diver, who proceeded to ./ demonstrate the possibilities of. this new i process, neatly applying.1 the flame to a r, sheet of steel which reposed on a couple / ; of iron trestles. . ■ • • ' ■ From the observation-windows the illusion that the diver was engaged upon salvage work on a sunken ship was heightened by his -apparently awkward movements in the green cloudy water. The impression was left that.this new invention will have a great future in 'salvage work on vessels sunk duringl the war, which it is impossible to raise intact owing to present' prohibitive costs.>