HUGE NAVAL DOCK

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 June 1940, Page 12

HUGE NAVAL DOCK

CONSTRUCTION IN SYDNEY.

SYDNEY, May 29.

A huge naval dock will be constructed in Sydney by the Commonwealth Government at an estimated cost of more than £3,000,000. The work will take at least two years to complete and will give employment to between 20,000 and 30,000 men. The dock will be capable of accommodating not only the largest battleship, but also merchant vessels as big as the Queen Elizabeth and the Queen Mary. The bulk of the material for the construction will be provided in Australia. ■ ■

The site will be the stretch of harbour between Pott’s Point, hitherto an exclusive residential district, and Garden Island, present headquarters of naval activities in Sydney. This site was adopted on the recommendation the British expert, Sir Leopold Savile, who inspected 20 sites through-

out Australia before making his decision. Details of the cost of the dock are: construction of coffer dam, together’ with filling, of reclaimed area, £348,000; construction of graving dock and 500 feet of wharf on east side of dock, £1,479,000; pumps, penstocks, two ship-type caissons, and workshop cranes, £433,600; dredging entrance to channel- j to .) docx, £34,700; construction of access roads, workshops, drainage and contingencies, £379,200; ~ construction of wharf 1000. feet long, £322,500. Although the construction of a capital ship dock in Sydney may take three years, and probably longer, experts believe that it . is essential for the protection of Australia' that tire work should'be pressed forward. The Minister for the' Interior (Senator Foil) said that the Commonwealth Government would lose no time in starting construction. ' ’' Few men in Australia have an intimate knowledge of. the construction of big docks, but.one.'experienced.dockyard’engineer said that it would he a

wonderful effort if the job was .completed in three years. Quite a big part of the task, he explained, would be the assembling of plant and material. Nor were the preparation of the actual basin and the piling and filling the main jobs.' Trained personnel, too, might be found a difficulty.