"The installation complete, it will begin operating 

 at full capacity during the present month." 



The Port of Salina Cruz. is completely artificial. It consists 

 of a repair and maintenance basin and an anchorage area separated 

 by two large wharves on which are -six .double - warehouses,- Originally, 

 it was intended to build only one breakwater which would extend from 

 the lighthouse bluff along the entire length of the wharves so as to 

 protect them from the waves and wind from the south, thus furnishing 

 an anchorage whose entrance would be to the Bast. While the break- 

 water was under construction, it was observed that after stormy days 

 with large waves from the south*, sand filled the region between the. 

 partly constructed breakwater and the wharves, that is r the area 

 which will be the harbor. The engineers then discovered the enormous 

 importance of the transport of sand which was constantly being 

 brought from the west. 



The direction of the breakwater was immediately changed and 

 turned more seaward and another had to be constructed to the east 

 so as to form the actual harbor. There was then an accretion of 

 sand from the lighthouse to the end of the breakwater. This large 

 area was quickly filled with sand, covering depths of 15 fathoms. 

 When this area was filled, sand began to enter the harbor. It has 

 been necessary to maintain a dredge for more than forty years to 

 remove the sand that had been deposited and is still being deposited. 

 This work has cost the government more than 50,000,000 pesos, (at 

 the present rate of exchange, 8.65 Ifexican pesos equal one U. S. 

 dollar), and the bay is still in the same danger, the channel shoals 

 constantly and there are large deposits of sand inside the harbor 

 making navigation of the channel from the harbor entrance to the 

 repair basin difficult. 



In later years, dredging has been very intermittent. This has 

 been a great factor in the loss of prestige of the port of Salina 

 Oruz, large ships have not been able to call, thus paralyzing 

 commerce in this region. The fact that. Salina Cruz and Puerto 

 Ifoxico are at the terminus of Tehuano Railroad make them strategic 

 points and a very important means of increasing the commerce with 

 the United States. The obstruction of the bay by sand carried 

 from the west, remained a great engineering problem. 



This sand which is brought from the west is not carried by 

 littoral currents but by the dynamic action of the waves which strike 

 the coast at an acute angle for the entire jear, in such a manner as 

 to carry the sand up on the shore and toward the east and then back 

 down on the inclined plane of the beach where it is caught by the 

 surf. This continual rise and fall, always with a force toward the 

 east, causes the eternal voyage of the sand that moves along the 

 whole coast to the region of Chiapas, where the wave attack is 



