MEMORABLE DAY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19383, 19 July 1926, Page 8

MEMORABLE DAY.

FINAL HOURS OF TENSION. DEVASTATING EXPLOSION. INSTANT SUCCESS REVEALED. They say to mountains. "Be ye removed.^ They say to the lesser floods. "Be dry. Under their rods aro the rocks reproved—they are not afraid ot that which is high. Then do the hill-tops shake to the summit — then is the bed of the deep laid bare. That the Sons of Mary may overcome it. pleasantly sleeping and unaware. This from "The Sons of Martha," in which Kipling pavs tribute to the whole fraternity 6f engineers, expresses what one felt at Arapuni on Saturday when the time was creeping slowly toward the "zero" hour for the firing of the charges. There had been check and double checkThere had been preparation for the last emergency. Orders of the day had hern issued to make every safeguard against accident or misunderstanding. Nothing had been left to chance. Civil engineers are inclined, outwardly at all events, to regard their job as a prosaic sort of thing, but there is nothing prosaic about a ton of explosive. The Last Hours. There was tension in the air from the moment work commenced that day. There had been tension for days. The layman could comprehend the dangerous possibilities, but the faces were plain to read. Until a late hour the previous night there had been uncertainty about the time of the. event, for some of the inevitable leakages through the thick concrete of the diversion tunnel had required grouting. Men toiled at this task in the night, and finally the tunnel was passed by Government officials, who watch every inch of the. way at Arapuni. On the intake dumpling, r ridiculously inadequate name for a mass of clay and rock that shuts out. a wild impetuous river from an excavation, men worked making it as frail as possible and salvaging everything worth while. Last vear a flood invaded the tunnel and die river was afterwards controlled by a cofferdam, which l* was feared would not be water-tight. But on Saturday with no support behind the wood it stood and was thoroughly watertight. Like busy ants, the large gang shovelled and picked and bored and pushed in plugs of "jelly." Above them on tho concrete entrance to the tunnel was the excellent joke of the night before. Some wit had climbed high and painted in huge black letters, "All water this way." The Legendary Taniwha. At the outlet end, with its mass of sinister-looking pipes packed with sudden death, another gang salvaged pumping gear and wire, ropeways. "How is the nervous tension ?" someone asked. "It is not the nervous, but the electrical tension of the wires that I'm concerned about," returned an official. And on everyone's lips was "Will she go ?" in all its variations. Some talked of a Maori prophesy, "They will never turn the Waikato." Why? "Because the taniwha lives here. No tuna above here. The taniwha eat the tuna. The taniwha will never let you turn the river." And so the shadow of an old legend and perhaps more than the shadow of surviving superstition come to grips with the "Sons of Martha." At 1 p.m. all access to the danger zone is cut off and watchers from the eastern cliff see half a dozen electricians busy with among those sinister pipes. Others are pouring water down the tubes. "Just tamping," is all the answer to an inquiry about this mysterious matter. At last all the men who, from the height, look like big spiders, hurry up the steep track to the top, except one who climbs a power pole. He is making the last connection. Watchers begin to breathe more rapidly. The hooter goes—the first warning—and still the spider on the pole fiddles with the wires. " Hope lie's enjoying himself. I won't until lie gets out of there," says a man above. Electricians Last. By this time the body of spectators are grouped on a far hilL The officials immediately concerned are in a sandbagged " pill box " on the west cliff whence they can view both ends. The second hooter goes after the spider has finally consented to get down from his pole and climb to the top. Five minutes—five palpitating minutes. A white flag waves from the observation station, another waves at the firing station opposite and bang goes the intake charge. A report like an aeroplane bomb and timber and clay fly up 20 feet. The debris does not give a channel-for the water and a gang of midgets is seen shovelling and picking and crow-barring and soon a channel has begun and it grows, like the trickle of the seawall, into a torrent. Instead of 60 seconds, it is 60 minutes before the water from the tunnel is flowing over the outlet dumpling. Benzine tins have been placed to mark the point of high water. When they float the red flag is to wave its signal for the second charge. The warning hooter goes. The yellow stream rises and rises. Soon now. A number of people seem to bo trying to swallow their suspense and failing. At last. The tins float. The red flag waves. A red one answers and then— The fact of the matter is that no one knows. The earth shakes. A great throb seems to come from the heart of Mother Earth. Some think they saw the body of the dumpling rise. Others know they did not. At the roar of the charge and the convulsion, their senses ceased to function until the great white cloud, flecked with flying fragments, rises to the clifftop level. Then they watch it go up and up. The crowd is well out of danger but one little party find that missiles are falling toward them and there are a few flurried seconds. Well missed, however. On the official " pill box " the debris falls in a shower but the roof holds.

The Miracle Accomplished. It is over. The harrier of rock has vanished. The mm' 'y water flows from the tunnel mouth through a broad cleancut canal created in the twinkling of an eye. Someone raises a cheer. From every face the look of tension has passed, but a high tension power line high above the blast is still shaking. Everyone is radiant. With a kind of mild surprise men look where falling rocks have buried themselves in the ground and pull out long jagged pieces of metal that once were pipes. And back to the edge they go to gaze once more at the magic wrought. The spectators come flocking from their hill and the ladies of Arapuni who understand engineering things and had shared the anxieties of the past days gather round. They are jubilant and congratulations fill the air. The river had been turned sufficiently to make the rest easy. The taniwha had been bested. Man and his machines had triumphed. Do you wish to make the mountains bare their head. And lay their new-cut tresses at. your feet? Do you want to turn a river in its bed. And plant a barren wilderness with wheat? It is easy! Give us dynamite and drills, Watch the iron-shouldered rocks lie down and quake As the thirsty desert, level goods and fills. And the valley we have dammed becomes i a lake!