A “NAVAL OCCASION.”

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20690, 12 April 1929, Page 13

A “NAVAL OCCASION.”

VISIT OF THE TOURVILLE. A SVASHINGTON TREATY CRUISER. (Special to Daily Times.) WELLINGTON, April 11. An interesting “ naval occasion ” : this year will be the visit to New Zealand of the French cruiser Tonrville, which left Brest last week on a world cruise. After visiting several French possessions in the West Indies, the Tourville will pass through the Panama Canal into the Pacifie. where calls will be made at Papeete (Tahiti) and Samoa. The Tourville will arrive at Auckland on July 21 and spend a week there before coming on to Wellington, where she as due on July 30. The cruiser will remain here until August 7, when she will depart for Australia, calling at Sydney, Hobart, Melbourne, and Fremantle, and proceeding thence •to Singapore. The Tourville will return to France via the Suez Canal, and is due at Toulon about the end of the year. Special interest attaches to the visit to New Zealand of the Tourville, for with the exception of H.M.A.S. Australia, which called at Wellington last year on her way from England to Australia, she will be the first “ Washington Treaty cruiser ” seen in the Dominion. The Australia, with a standard displacement of 10.000 tons, is 630 feet in length and 68 feet four inches extreme breadth, and has a mean draught of 16ft Sin. Her armament comprises eight 8-inch guns, several 4-inch anti-aircraft guns, and two quadruple sets of torpedo tubes. The Tourville, with a standard displacement of 10.000 tons, is" 62Gft Sin in length and 62£t 4in in breadth, with a mean draught of 10ft 6in. Built at 'the Lorient dockyard, she was launched on August 24, 1926, and completed early last year. On her steaming trials the Tourville attained a speed of 35.3 knots, which makes her one of the fastest warships in the world, the “ record” being claimed by Italy, whose new 10,000-ton cruiser Trento made 38 knots on her trials last month. ' The Tourville, which has oil-fired boilers, is propelled by geared turbines developing 130,000 shaft horse-power at full 'speed. The Tourville carries a main armament of eight 8-inch guns and eight 3-inch antiaircraft guns, and two triple sets of torpedo tubes. Other ships of her class completed for the French Navy are the, Duquesne, Suffren, and Colbert. REQUEST FOR VISIT TO JUNEDIN. A copy of a letter sent by the Minister of Railways (Mr W. B. Taverner) to the French Consul in Auckland (51. Paul de Serre) has been received by the secretary of the Otago Expansion League (Mr W, B. Steel). Mr Taverner has made a request that Dunedin should be included in the itinerary of the French cruiser which is to visit New Zealand waters this year.