To Salvage Rest Of Niagara s Gold

Northern Advocate, 15 March 1947, Page 3

To Salvage Rest Of Niagara s Gold

DIVER JOHNSTONE PLANS

(Special) AUCKLAND, This Day. LATE this year an attempt will probably be made to recover the 35 bars of gold still lying in the wreck of the liner Niagara off Whangarei Heads.

T)ie attempt will probably be made by Mr John Johnstone, the world-famous deep sea diver, who took a prominent part in the original salvage in 1941.

Mr Johnstone will descend the 438 ft to the wreck in a new steel diving bell he has designed especially for the purpose. “Ever since we ceased operations in 1941 I have had plans for an improved bell at the back of my mind,” he said yesterday. AT" GREATER DEPTHS “I hope to prove that salvage is possible at far greater depths than have yet been attempted. “My new observation chamber will be capable of descending as far as 1000 ft below the surface.” With the bell they had used in 1941. he said, it had not been possible to reach all the gold, and many boxes in inaccessible parts of the debris had been left. His proposed new bell would recover these. As some of the bars had been irretrievably lost in the mud, the value of the salvageable gold remaining was probably about £IOO,OOO. The gold remaining is still the property of the Bank of England but by agreement with the bank the salvage party will take 50 per cent of the gold that is retrieved—considerably moi'e than the 24 per cent they were allowed on their first operations. Income tax, however, will claim a large proportion of profits after all salvage expenses have been paid. An Australian engineering company has agred to build the new diving bell at a cost of about £BSO. Smaller than the original one use by Mr Johnstone, it has a grab attached to the chamber and operated from inside. This will dispense with the former laborious system of juggling with a separate grab from the ship, with telephone directions to the winchman the diver’s only means of assisting the recovery of the boxes. HOLDS ONE MAN Where the old bell accommodated two observers, the new model will only be large enough to hold one man. The smaller design will make for greater manoeuvrability in the search of confined spaces among the broken decks and twisted hull of the wreck. Weighing 35cwt. the bell will be made of Hi n. welded steel and will be over 7ft high, 3ft wide at the base and sft at the top. A spotlight to pierce the gloom of the ocean bed will be powered by batteries, and the only communication with the vessel above will be a telephone. Hung out from the ship on a boom, the bell will be suspended by a steel wire with a breaking strain of 17 tons. Hermetically sealed, the inside of the chamber will be unaffected by the tremendous pressure of the depths -and

it will not be necessary for divers to be lowered in stages to accustom Them to pressure variations. No air will be pumped into it as the occupant will breath oxygen from cylinders, exhaling through soda lime to keep the amount of carbon dioxide in the bell to a minimum. Mr Johnstone believes that the salvage work can be successfully combined with the activities of marine botanists and intends to invite members of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research to accompany him.

The major part of the bullion recovered from the Niagara was valued at nearly £2,400,000. Mr Johnstone does not expect any difficulty in assembling a crew and hopes to begin work some time in November.

He will avoid salvage work in the winter when the weather frequently permits only five or six days work a month.