The disastrous collision of the Sound steamers Narragansett and
Stonington was quickly followed by one at sea, by which two great
passenger ships escaped instant destruction almost by a hair's
breadth.
Shortly after noon, Monday, June 12, the National Line steamship
Queen, bound from London to New York, and within 300 miles of her
journey's end, ran into the Anchor Line steamship Anchoria, on the way
from New York to Glasgow. The bow of the Queen struck the Anchoria on
the port side, about twenty feet abaft the foremast, smashing a great
hole through the iron hull. Two compartments of the Anchoria filled
immediately, but the partitions stood firm, and the other compartments
sufficed to keep the vessel afloat. The bow of the Queen was badly
crushed, and her forward compartment was flooded. Fortunately the
bulkhead proved stanch, and the ship was saved. The fog was very
thick, and both ships were going at full speed. It is said that the
captain of the Anchoria mistook the whistle of the Queen for that of
the Anchoria's companion vessel, the Victoria, which left New York at
the same time, and was probably not far away, and before the error was
discovered the ships were too close to avoid the catastrophe. Had the
sea been rough or the partitions less stanch, both ships must have
gone to the bottom almost instantly.
The passengers of the Anchoria were transferred to the Queen, which
was least hurt, and the two ships sailed together for New York,
arriving Tuesday noon.
These two collisions, coming in such quick succession and imperiling
so many lives, give terrible emphasis to the dangers attending
navigation in foggy weather. They make very pertinent also the query
whether the means now employed for discovering the position
and nearness of unseen vessels are at all commensurate with the
necessities of the case, or with the means already known, and known
to be well calculated to prevent such dangers. In a dense fog the
ordinary ship's light is visible scarcely more than a ship's length;
and as it proved in the case of the Narragansett and Stonington, the
time between thus sighting an approaching vessel and the instant of
collision is fatally brief. The recent test of electric headlights
for ships in this harbor clearly demonstrated the possibility of
projecting a beam of electric light through the densest fog for a
thousand feet or more, and through ordinary fogs a distance several
times as great.
Except in very rough weather the steam whistle can be heard a long
distance, but it is liable to be a treacherous guide. It is not always
possible to determine by the ear alone the direction from which a
sound comes; and it would seem that a mistake of this nature was made
on the Stonington, since the order intended to change her course
away from that of the Narragansett only served to precipitate the
collision. Had the whistle of the Queen signaled her course it could
not have been mistaken for that of a ship sailing in the opposite
direction, and the safety of two great floating hotels and their
occupants would not have been imperiled thereby.
Means for the better penetration of fogs, for determining the
direction of unseen sources of sounds, and for enabling steamers to
announce to all within hearing the course they are pursuing, seem
therefore to be imperative necessities on shipboard. The first is
furnished by the electric headlight, with a system of projection
similar to but more efficient than that used on locomotives. The last
would be provided by an efficient code of whistle signals to indicate
the several points of compass. The second need is supplied by the
instrument figured in the accompanying illustration.
[Illustration: PROFESSOR MAYER'S TOPOPHONE.]
The aim of the topophone, which was invented and patented by Professor
A. M. Mayer, last winter, is to enable the user to determine quickly
and surely the exact direction and position of any source of sound.
Our figure shows a portable style of the instrument; for use
on ship-board it would probably form one of the fixtures of the
pilot-house or the "bridge," or both. In most cases arising in sailing
through fogs, it would be enough for the captain or pilot to be
sure of the exact direction of a fog horn, whistling buoy, or steam
whistle; and for this a single aural observation suffices.
Every one has twirled a tuning fork before the ear, and listened to
the alternate swelling and sinking of the sound, as the sound waves
from one tine re-enforce or counteract those from the other tine. The
topophone is based upon the same fact, namely, the power of any sound
to augment or destroy another of the same pitch, when ranged so that
the sound waves of each act in unison with or in opposition to those
of the other.
Briefly described, the topophone consists of two resonators (or any
other sound receivers) attached to a connecting bar or shoulder rest.
The sound receivers are joined by flexible tubes, which unite for part
of their length, and from which ear tubes proceed. One tube, it will
be observed, carries a telescopic device by which its length can be
varied. When the two resonators face the direction whence a sound
comes, so as to receive simultaneously the same sonorous impulse, and
are joined by tubes of equal length, the sound waves received from
them will necessarily re-enforce each other and the sound will be
augmented. If, on the contrary, the resonators being in the same
position as regards the source of sound, the resonator tubes differ in
length by half the wave length of the sound, the impulse from the one
neutralizes that from the other, and the sound is obliterated.
Accordingly, in determining the direction of the source of any sound
with this instrument, the observer, guided by the varying intensity
of the sound transmitted by the resonators, turns until their
openings touch the same sound waves simultaneously, which position
he recognizes either by the great augmentation of the sound (when the
tube lengths are equal), or by the cessation of the sound, when the
tubes vary so that the interference of the sound waves is perfect. In
either case the determination of the direction of the source of the
sound is almost instantaneous, and the two methods may be successively
employed as checks upon each other's report.
It is obvious that with such a help the pilot in a fog need never be
long in doubt as to the direction of a warning signal; and if need
be he can without much delay, by successive observations and a little
calculation, determine, approximately at least, the distance of the
sounding body.
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