A NEW RESEARCH SHIP.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20906, 21 December 1929, Page 17

A NEW RESEARCH SHIP.

DISCOVERY 11. ' • LAUNCH AT GLASGOW.’^ (From Oub Own CoßKKSFonnxm.) LONDON, November 7. The Royal Research ship. Discovery IX. was launched at Port Glasgow on Saturday by Mrs Borlcy, wife of Mr J. C. Borlcy, a member of the Discovery Committee. The vessel had.her boiler* and machinery on board, and was practically ready for trials. The ship was built by Messrs Ferguson Brothers, of Port Glasgow, at the order of the Crown Agents for the Colonies, to the design of Messrs Flannery, Baggallay, and Johnson, their consulting naval .rchitects, and under-their supervision. She is 232 feet over all, with a breadth of 30 feet and a draught of 16 feet when folly loaded, and Is specially strengthened for resisting ice pressure. She is designed to attain a speed of 13 knots, and can steam 6000 miles at full speed and 9000 miles st economic speed. Discovery 11. replace* the R.R.S. Discovery, which has been lent on charter by the Falkland Isles Government for service in Sir Douglas Mawson’s expedition, and is due to sail for the Antarctic from London on December 7. She will be under the scientific leadership of Dr S. W. Kemp, with Commander W. M. Carey, R.N., in executive command. The ship will carry a scientific staff of six. a* well as eight officers and a surgeon. The full complement is 50. STUDY OF WHALES.

She is to carry out an extensive pro* gramme of marine investigations, assisted by a smaller vessel, the R.R.S. William Scoresby, and a marine biological station at South Georgia, at which observations arc mads on the whales brought in by one of the whaling companies. The object of the investigations is to determine the effect of man’s operations on the stock of whales, and to account for the great natural fluctuations in abundance. To carry Out her programme the Discovery 11. carries a very full equipment of the latest pattern of gear and apparatus For sounding she is equipped with a deep-water machine carrying five miles of piano wire, and with deep and shallowwater ccho-sounding apparatus of the latest Admiralty pattern. Three small winches provide the means of obtaining temperatures and water samples, and smaller forms of oceanic life. A large winch, with reels carrying 1000 and 5000 fathoms of very heavy wire is indredges, and trawls.