Torpedo-Proofing Ships with Air Tanks 



Air-cushions to run along sides of ship are 

 proposed as a protection against torpedoes 



SINCE the beginning of the Great 

 War, and particularly since Germany 

 adopted the submarine policy, the 

 brains and inge- 

 nuity of inventors 

 of all classes and 

 ratings have been 

 directed toward 

 finding some means 

 of counteracting 

 the destructive ef- 

 fects of the torpedo. 

 Many expedients 

 have been sug- 

 gested, ranging all 

 the way from ex- 

 tremely feasible 

 propositions to the 

 wildest vaporings. 

 The following arti- 

 cle deals with one 

 of the more prob- 

 able ones. 



Hudson Alaxim, 

 who has, himself, 

 suggested a method 



for torpedo-proofing ships in which he 

 makes use of the principle of the "gun 

 silencer," states that the explosive charge 

 in the war-head of a modern torpedo con- 

 sists of about four cubic feet of T.N.T. 

 (tri-nitro-toluol). When the detonator 

 inside the charge is fired 

 the T.N.T. explodes, and 

 within less than the 

 twenty-thousandth part 

 of a second the four cubic 

 feet of explosive are trans- 

 formed into 40,000 cubic 

 feet of gases, having a 

 temperature of about 

 5,000 degrees F. The 

 mass of water surround- 

 ing the explosive offers a 

 greater resistance to the 

 sudden expansion of the 

 gases than the wall of the 

 ship and as the expansion 

 follows the line of least 

 resistance, the wall of the 

 ship is crushed and the 



A cruiser in dry-dock, showing how the air- 

 chambers are attached below the waterUne 



Diagrammatic view of the 

 latest torpedo protection 



expanding gases enter into the body of the 

 ship with destructive violence. 



With this picture of a torpedo's effect 

 before us we are 

 prepared to under- 

 stand the invention 

 of Thomas G. O. 

 Thurston, of Lon- 

 don, England, re- 

 cently patented in 

 the United States. 

 Thurston, taking 

 the terrific expan- 

 sion of the gases 

 generated by mod- 

 ern explosives into 

 account, seeks to 

 provide a system of 

 large resistance and 

 expansion cham- 

 bers which act like 

 an air-cushion by 

 which the force of 

 the inrushing gases 

 is smothered and 

 robbed, to a great 

 extent, of its destructive potentiality. 



The inventor proposes to construct 

 these shock-absorbing chambers along the 

 sides of the ship for a suitable distance 

 forward and aft. He suggests various 

 forms, all showing a decided bulging out- 

 ward, beyond the normal 

 contour of the ship. The 

 back of these bulging 

 outer chambers, formed 

 by a suitably stiffened 

 bulkhead or inner frame- 

 work, separates the outer 

 chamber from the inner 

 compartment, which pro- 

 vides the final and strong- 

 est resistance to the ex- 

 panding gases. This in- 

 ner compartment has a 

 strongly braced back, 

 curving inward toward 

 the interior of the ship, 

 and the air contained in 

 it is intended to act as an 

 additional cushion. 



