HULLO, SOUTH ISLAND!

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12406, 27 March 1926, Page 5

HULLO, SOUTH ISLAND!

NEW TELEPHONE CABLE CONNECTING THE ISLANDS BIG JOB WELL DONE INTERESTING SCENES ON BOARD THE TUTANEKAI At nine o’clock yesterday morning the final touches were put to the splicing of the new Cook Strait telephone cable, and at a point a little distance off Blind River the last loop of the joined-up line dropped over the bows of the Tutanekai, the Government cablelaying steamer. As it disappeared in the sea cameras clicked, and a weary but happy cable-laying staff heaved sighs of relief that the job—the biggest yet attempted by the New Zealand Telegraph De-partment-had been carried through without a hitch.

A short length of cable had been laid from the South Island terminal on Monday, and buoyed off-shore. Then the Tutanekai. returned to Lyall Bay, intending to' make a start 'at daylight on Wednesday with the main portion of the work—the laying of the thirty miles of cable from the 'Wellington end. Heavy southerly weather, however, precluded any chance of proceeding satisfactorily with such a task, and the steamer waited for the sea to go down. On Thursday morning found the gale gone and the sea wonderfully with a light northerly breeze blow mg. WORK AT LYALL BAY At six o’clock the Tutanekai put the Ljall Bay end of the cable over, and the ship’s launch and a surf boat snaked it shoreward. As the cable paid out over the how sheave barrels were lashed to it to keep it from sinking to the bottom and so making the haul too heavy. When the surf was reached the launch cast off and left the work of getting the cable through the broken water to the boat. It was heavy pulling, but the boatmen' are Cxpert at this sort thing, snd under Mr Williams, one of the ship’s officers, the cable was brought to shore, where a staff of telegraph men were waiting to tail on to the hauling line and drag the cable up the beach, where it was made fast. The end was then opened up for connection to instruments temporarily installed in a shed there for the purpose of -noting conditions in the cable, to which reference will presently be made. The ship party then went aboard the Tutanekai, having a damp passage through the surf. CROSSING THE STRAIT . At 8.30 the ship heaved up her anchor and began the thirty mile iourney to the other side, of the Strait The cable passed from the hold in which it had been carefully stowed around the drum of a rotometer which measured the length, then through another instrument which recorded the tensile strain exerted by the length depending from the ship, and finally over a large sheave at tl»e forecastle head, whence it trailed away into the sea. Officers on the bridge took frequent observations of various landmarks, so that the ship’s course could be plotted exactly on the chart and the line followed by the cable permanently recorded. The ship end of the cable was connected up with testing instruments, by means of which imperfections in the cable —if any developed —could be detected and measures taken to locate and remedy them. These tests were made every : few minutes, and at intervals a telephone was submitted for the delicate testing apparatus and speech could be held with Lyall Bay watchers. In both volume and clearness of sound—despite the neoessarily imperfect makeshift nature of

the connections —the words came wonderfully well over the cable to those on the ship out in the Strait. "JOINING UP” About five o’clock, the ship, having come almost exactly to the desired spot, the buoy marking the end of the southern shore cable was picked up and hauled' aboard. Two experts were put ashore to co-operate with the ship’s staff in making final tests, and as the weather held fine it was decided to go straight ahead with the work of joining up. The main cable,. of which a portion remained in the ship’s hold, was cut, and the armouring and protective coverings of the actual telephone conductors in the centre were laid back for some distance. Exhaustive tests of these conductors—four small copper wires about No. 13 standard gauge in size—followed to see that everything was in thorough order, and the work of splicing began. It was a delicate task, which continued throughout the night and early morning. The outer coverings were then replaced, and strongly reinforced by additional heavy iron wire armour. < “GOOD WORK WELL DONE” That done, the cable was dropped overboard, and the ship returned to Wellington after making a call at Lyall Bay to pick up mark buoys which had been left there yesterday. This in brief is the story of the laying of the latest Cook Strait cable, which is intended primarily for telephone work only, though at a pinch it could be used for ordinary telegraphic traffic. The shore connections are not yet complete, but it is expected that by next week two of the conductors will be in position to maintain telephonic communication between Wellington, Blenheim, and Nelson during the whole twenty-four hours of the day. Later on all the North and South Island telephone stations will enjoy this advantage. THE MEN RESPONSIBLE Captain J. Bollons, master of the Tutanekai, was in charge of the work of laying the cable, assisted by Captain W. Whiteford, of the Marine Depart ment, whose special task was to make constant observations fixing the ship’s course. Associated with them, in charge of the technical Work, were Mr A. Gibbs, acting chief telegraph engineer; Mr P. Miles, cable and equipment engineer and Mr A. Bollons, assistant electrician. Representing tbe contractors for the supply of the cable, Messrs Siemens Brothers, Limited, were Messrs A. Holloway, technical expert, and O. W. Salmon, of Cory, Wright, and Salmon, the firm’s New Zealand agents. The Telegraph Department’s technical staff had a very arduous time of it, and are to he congratulated upon having carried the iob through successfully, without anything in the nature of a troublesome hitch.