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Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 409, 18 July 1928, Page 2

WAIKAWA LEAVES. —The Union Company reports that the Waikawa left New Plymouth on Monday for Lautoka, where she is due on July 21. From there the vessel will proceed to Vancouvw, San Francisco and Los Angeles, to load for Apia, Wellington, Nelson, Melbourne and Sydney. She will clear Los Angeles about September 10. ANOTHER WILD SCHEME. —There is a scheme under way to fleece the American taxpayers of further millions of dollars, states the “Shipping World.” They are being told that £105,000,000 must be spent on ships to replace the present United States merchant marine by 1940. That is the story which was sprung on a special .committee of the House of Representatives by Mr. H. G. Smith, president of the National Council of American Shipbuilders. It has been declared that the object is to "wrest seaborne trade from Britain and to give the United States a navy reserve of merchant marine seamen just as Britain has." The main scheme, fathered by the Trans-Oceanic Company and placed before the committee, involves a Government loan of nearly £20,000,000 for the construction of a fleet of six 35,000-ton Atlantic liners, which it is claimed would be faster than the Mauretania, which is the fastest liner afloat.

NORWAY’S MOTOR FLEET.—Norway is rapidly consolidating its position as relatively the leading motor sliipowning country ->!' the w rid. states the "Motor Ship." At the end of this year, 50 per cent, of her fleet will consist of oilengined ships of the most modern type, a large proportion being cargo liners of up to 14 knots, and many of the remainder the latest <-lass of economical tankers. This prediction is based on figures which have just been issued, showing that at the present time the Norwegian mercantile fleet numbers 2.765,000 tons gross, of which one-third is represented by motor ships. Forty-one Dieselengined vessels totalling 376,000 tons are on order, and these will practically all be completed within the year, so that by the beginning of 1929. the motor fleet will total about i. 275,000 tons. In the meantime, a certain number of steamers will have been rendered obsolete, so that the Diesel tonnage will be at least one-half of the total. A Norwegian firm, Messrs. Wilhelm Wilhelmsen. will, moreover, probably be the largest motor shipowners in the world for they now have 22 ships of 190,000 tons in service and six of 56,000 tons under construction. The Olsen, Klaveness and Mowinckel Lines each have about 70,000 tons of motor vessels in service.