EXPLOSIONS

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 143648, 16 November 1911, Page 4

EXPLOSIONS

HOW AND WHY THEY HAPPEN IN WARSHIPS. ■Tho frightful catastrophe in the French battleship Libert© contes as the climax of a long series of disastrous explosions, most of which were attributed to the instability or modern explosives (writes tho naval correspondent of tho London Daily Mail). The old black powder was a comparatively trustworthy agent. Spontaneous explosions with it were very rare. But tbo new powders have a terror of their own, all the greater because its cause cannot bo located. Tho first instance of tho destruction of a largo ship by tho spontaneous detonation of her magazines was the Maine. Thus American battleship was lying in Havana Harbour on the night of February 15, 1898, when suddenly people in other ships heard what sounded like tho discharge of a shot. Everyone by some instinct looked towards tho Maine. As they looked they saw her bow rise out of tho water and a column of fire and smoke stream up from the centre of tho vessel, with an appalling and prolonged crash, after which tho hull disappeared with 254 officers and men. It was supposed at tho time that the Maine, had met her terrible end through Spanish treachery, and that a mine had been exploded under her which had detonated nor magazines* But when, this year, her hull was recovered and examined, it became clear that there had been no mine. IN THE RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR. Several years passed before the circumstances of tho Maine disaster were repeated. But in tho Russo-Japanese war occurred two cases of similar explosions. On April 13, 1904, the Russian battleship Petroparlosk, while returning to Port Arthur, struck a Japanese mine. It exploded under her hows, with a, violent report. The concussion must have detonated the mines or the torpedo heads and high explosives which she carried in her magazines. Immediately after tho first crash precisely tho same phenomenon seen in the Maine occurred. A blast of flame and cloud of smoko roso high from her deck forward. “In this cloud,” says tho Russian Captain Somcnoff, an eye-witness of tho dreadful scene, “I saw the ship’s foremast. It was slanting, helpless, not as if it was falling, but as if it was suspended in the air. ... A third explosion ! White steam now began to mix with the brown cloud. The boilers had burst! Suddenly the stern of tho battleship rose straight in the air. . . It appeared to me as if tho after part of the Petropavlosk, all that was visible of her, suddenly opened out and belched forth fire and flames like a volcano.” One minute later all was over; the ship had sunk. Yet it was not the mine that sent her to tho bottom. Mines were repeatedly struck by both Russian and Japanese ships with relatively small damage. But when the magazines wont off there was instant catastrophe.

A few weeks later the Japanese battleship Hatsusc struck a mine which exploded her magazines, and she wont to tho bottom in the same way, with heavy loss of life. Tho Japanese Navy, which used specially powerful explosives, possibly manufactured in haste with insufficient care, suffered two further disasters after the war. Tho flagship Mikasa blew up in Sasebo Harbour in September. 19U5. It was thought at first that the explosion had been caused by treachery, but; evidence obtained ‘after tho ship was raised showed indisputably that her high explosives had been at fault. In 1908 the old Japanese cruiser Matsushima was destroyed at sea in precisely the same manner, with great loss of life. THE JENA CATASTROPHE: In the interval the Brazilian battleship Aquidaban blow up in harbour in 1906, and again her loss was beyond question traced to her high explosives. But tho most terrible affair in t-he long series, and the most disquieting in its effect upon morale, was the Jena catastrophe. Tho French battleship of that name was lying in dock at 'ionion ir> March, 1907. Suddenly, without any warning, a loud report was heard in the ship. It rang out like the discharge of a Cm. gun, and for an instant no attention was paid to it, as it was supposed that a gun had been Hrecl by accident. Alter a perceptible interval came another violent, prolonged, heavy report. Denso clouds or smoke rose irom tho ship. The after-part was blown to pieces. A shower of blazing fragments, live shells, and splinters ot shells flow up in the air, with blackened human forms. ;Mon poured up from below torn, burnt, and mutilated, with blazing clothes, and fled Irom the vessel, pursued by the roar of repeated explosions. Standing resolutely to their work on board her, a little band made heroic attempts to save her Irom complete destruction, but in vain. About 250 men were killed or injured, and the Jena’s captain was among the dead. The ship v.ao so injured as to be incapable of repair.

A disaster so terrible—for at that date the Jena was one ot the newest French battleships in service—demanded vigilant investigation. By some the catastrophe was attributed to an Anarchist plot or sedition among the crew. There was no evidence of either. To remove tho profound disquietude in Franco and in the French nary a long series of inquiries was hold. There wero three theories as to tho cause of tho explosions: Wireless waves upsetting tho unstable chemical or electrical equilibrium which exists in the components of modern powders; an accident due to careless.icea in the handling of powder or projectiles; and absolutely spontaneous detonation. The first theory was nst examined with any care, though the effects of wireless electricity aro peculiar, and there is a certain type of Hertzian wave which can penetrate any metal except lead. Tho general belief was that a particular explosive, “13 powder,” was the real cause, and that it had spontaneously exploded. Colonel Mnraat, indeed, showed that it was “mathematically impossible” for this powder to explode of its own accord. But M. Yieille, the distinguished chemist, and General Oossot, a great artillerist, admitted that such explosion was possible. Captain Lepidi wont further, and declared that not only was this powder dangerou©, but the peril from it was extreme. “1 do not assort,” he smid, “that nil our ships will blow up to-morrow, but 1 do say that all of them may blow' up.” A few weeks later his statement was signally justified. A quantity of “B powder” took fire spontaneously whilo the committee were

examining it, and, had the quantity been largo, there would have been no committee left. But the experiments which they made suggested that if tho powder wero kept cool and not allowed to grow too old tho danger would not bo great. And so. it is believed, a quantity of “B powder” was retained in service. . TESTS IN THE BRITISH NAVY. After the Jena catastrophe there was much searching of heart in the British Navy. Tho stocks of cordito were overhauled and chemically examined, and so unsatisfactory was tho result of the tests in many cases that tons of this propellant were burnt or dumped into the sea. At the same time refrigerating machinery was hurriedly fitted to tho magazines of British ships to “keep tho powder cool,” the modern variant of Cromwell’s “keep your powder dry.” Tho fearful disaster in the Liberto, where refrigerating machinery was fitted to the magazines, Is perhaps tho most extraordinary in the whole series. The ship is stated to have caught fire, and to have been on fire for several hours before the first, of tho series of explosions which destroyed . her. But tho modern warship contains little or nothing that will of Tsushima, terrific fires broke o.it in the Russian ships, this was because of the peculiar action of shell explosives, which seemed, bo eye-witnesses declared, to render even steel combustible. And the fires only gained way I because the hoses wero shattered by Japanese projectiles.