WEATHER BUREAU. 179 



ing steamers report the fact by wireless telegraph to the Navy wireless 

 station at Tatoosh Island, and, in case of fog, to use this means to 

 report their passage to and from the strait. 



The service rendered by the seacoast telegraph and vessel-reporting 

 stations of the bureau has been of great benefit to shipping in times 

 of disaster during the last year. At about lip. m., September 1, 

 1910, the steamer Watson, bound from Puget Sound to San Francisco, 

 with passengers and general cargo, ran ashore at Waddah Island, 

 Wash. It was floated at 1 a. m., September 3, by the aid of the life- 

 saving tug Snohomish, which was wired for at Port Angeles by our 

 observer at Port Crescent immediately after the %vreck. On Decem- 

 ber 10, 1910, follomng the wreck of the schooner William II. David- 

 son, our repairman at Manteo, N. C, established a temporary tele- 

 graph station on the coast about 30 miles north of Manteo, at the 

 scene of the disaster, and rendered great assistance to the master and 

 crew. Twelve wrecks occurred between Cape Henry and Hatteras 

 during the year, aU of which were reported by the hfe-saving stations 

 to the officials at the Weather Bureau telegraph offices at Cape 

 Henry, Hatteras, and Manteo, who in turn promptly telegraphed 

 the information to the various agents, owners, revenue cutters, 

 ^v^ecking companies, and maritime exchanges. It is estimated that 

 fully $328,250 was saved through the assistance rendered the 

 vessels in distress as a result of these timely reports. Reports of 

 18 casualties on Lake Huron, in which property valued at $350,000 

 was endangered, were also given out from the Alpena, Mich., station, 

 as a result of information received by our observer at that point over 

 the Weather Bureau land and cable lines running between the main- 

 land and Middle Island and Thunder Bay Island. 



CUMATOLOGICAL DIVISION. 



The Annual Report of the Chief of the Weather Bureau, 1909-10, 

 was printed and ready for distribution early in the present calendar 

 year. The transfer of the composition and printing of the Monthly 

 Weather Review from the central office of the Weather Bureau to 

 the Government Printing Office has occasioned some delay in the 

 issue of that publication, but it is probable that arrangements can 

 be made whereby its issue at a slightly earlier date may be possible. 



The issue of the National Weather Bulletin, weekly during the 

 crop-growing season and monthly thereafter, continued as in the 

 past. Its increased circulation as a result of numerous requests 

 mdicate that its value is rapidly becoming more widely known and 

 appreciated. 



The weekly and monthly summaries of the wea-ther conditions in 

 Porto Rico and Hawaii were issued as in the past, as well as those 

 for Iowa, in cooperation with the weather service of that State. 



Weekly summaries of the snow and ice conditions, with special 

 reference to the districts east of the Rocky Mountains, were issued as 

 usual during the \vinter. as well as the monthly summaries of 

 snowfall conditions, for the benefit of irrigation and other interests 

 in the mountain portions of the West. The latter contain more data 

 than formerly, and the information they present as to the amount 

 and distribution of the snow in the mountains, and its condition as 

 regards prospects for early or late melting, has proved of much value 



