American Tonnage

Manawatu Times, Volume XL, Issue 13949, 30 July 1918, Page 7

American Tonnage

HUGE AMERICAN FLEET. ITS AMAZING GROWTH. The steady growth of the American, merchant marine in all classes of vessels was revealed to-day for the_ first time since the war began in statistics from the Department of Commerce, says the "New York Herald” of June 9. They show that in the first five months of this year there have been built in this country and officially numbered by the Bureau of Navigation a total of 629 vessels of 687,055 gross tons. The merchant fleet of the United States now amounts to approximately 10,000,000 gross tons, not including merchant craft under control of the army and navy as transports and supply ships. At the beginning of January 26,742 merchant vessels of 9,343, 224,: gross tons were flying the Stars and Stripes on trips across the Atlantic with food and munitions., into the Caribbean and Pacific with American products for foreign customers and on the lakes and rivers of this country as part of the nation’s domestic transportation system. This tremendous fleet is second only to the merchant tonnage of Great Brit.ain. It includes all new vessels built under the direction of the Shipping Board, and thousands of other ships, smaller in tonnage but greater in carrying capacity, which play so large a part in commerce and the maintenance of a favourable balance of trade.

All merchant vessels are required bylaw to register with the Bureau of Navigation of the Department of Commerce and to receive an official identification number, before being permitted to fly the flag of the United States. The number is awarded when the finished ship is measured for gross tonnage capacity, which is the content of the ship in terms of 100 cubic feet and the internationally accepted method of expressing size. The Shipping Board, building exclusively cargo ships, has adopted deadweight tonnage as the medium of computing new tonnage, deadweight capacity being the actual weight of cargo and bunker coal which can bo carried. The deadweight tonnage of a cargo ship is about 50 per cent, greater than its gross tonnage, but in a passenger vessel is less, because the space is occupied by passenger accommodation. The former Gorman liner Vaterland, now the Leviathan, has a gross tonnage of 54,000, but a deadweight capacity of only about 5000 tons., which illustrates why, in dealing with all typos of ships, gross tonnage, or the actual size regardless of the space allotted to cargo, has been chosen internationally as more truly indicative of the size of a fleet. There has been a steady inerenso in new ships this year, the May tonnage being throe times as great as the January output. In the first month of 1918 there were 57 ships of 04,759 tons given official numbers. In February 84 ships of 117,001 gross tons were numbered. March saw a notable jump in the production of small ships, numbers being awarded to 138, the tonnage being 147,145. The record in April was 105 ships of 103,050 tons, and in May 185 .ships of 194,405 tons. In a single month this year the American merchant fleet has soon a growth almost as great as during the entire first year of the European war.