Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 231, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 September 1911 — TANGLE of the MAINE IS APPALING [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TANGLE of the MAINE IS APPALING

MM IE work of raising the Maine ■ In Havana harbor 1b not more | than half finished. While re- ■ ports have been sent out from time to time'flxing the date for the final raising of the derelict, not one of such reports has been authorized, not one of them 1$ or can be reliably. It was stated nearly a year ago that the ship would be raised by February 1, 1911. Today the greater part of the ship Is buried In sticky, black mud. and there Is every possibility that six months will lapse, if not a much longer time, before the hull is fully exposed and raised, If it is ever found possible to float any part of It And no one is tp blame for the delay. The job has proved itself just about ten times greater and more formidable than it originally gave promise of being. Ship a Mass of Twisted Steel. No one who has not seen the wreck and been on it and through It can understand its a lmost impossibly tangled condition. The stern of the stop, Is comparatively intact. But not more than a third of what was the Original vessel is recognizable as such.' Amidshlp the tangle begins. Funnels, conning towers, decks, cabins, engines, machinery, are all a tangled pathetic mass that even the most expert of naval engineers and constructors have been unable to classify properly. The whole bpw was blown off and turned around and pointed back toward the stern. The old controversy of what caused the explosion Is still on, but experts declare the uncovering of the Maine will never solve the mystery. The titanic force of the explosion —or explosions, for there .were two of them without question—lmpresses the observer as having been appalling. Think of a force that would break a steel battleship in twain and dance the half of it about like a cork.

The old controversy as to whether the Maine was blown up from without or within will not be settled by the uncovering of the wreck—not If a million experts render their “Indisputable" opinions. The consensus of opinion lb now, as It ever was, that an outside mine explosion preceded and precipitated the Interior explosion —that of the ship's magaslne. All testimony goes to establish the fact that there were two distinct explosions. But the Spanish folk will never admit that there were two. Those wjio even incline to listen to the suggestion that there might have been two contend that if two occurred that within the ship must have been the first. Some, but not many, American*, hold to the opinion that the wreck was caused solely by an explosion of the vessel's magaslne. . Lends Color to Theory. But the fact that the destruction of the vessel celebrated on Calle Cuba, In Havana, before-It occurred, and that that celebration was participated tn by Bpanish royalists, has a decided tendency to lend color to the theory that the wreck was planned. Lurid stories of all ports to “new discoveries" which ana calculated to “clear up the mystery" are bn constant, daily tap la Havana. Within a week a circumstantial yarn to the effect that a wire cable leading from the bow, of the Maine to Caban aa had been discovered went the rounds. All such stories are myths. But the Impressiveness, the wlerdness, the creepiaess, the oppreealve oncannlnea of the* wreck Itself is by no means mythical. It gets on one’* nerves. Eighty-eight men perished when the Maine went down. About SS skeletons —or part* of skeletons have been * recovered. As this is written three skulls gleam their ghastly welcome from the slftue that •overs the tangled wreckage. The

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There is, roughly, 25 feet of mud to take out yet before the Maine can he “raised.” The piling that forma the exterior of each of the caissons composing the cofferdam is 50 feet long. Between 26 and 30 feet of water was pumped out. There is nothing but mud remaining. .But it is glue-like mud and is 10 times harder to get rid of than the water was. Hydraulic pumps have been installed, but the work' put upon them is so unusual that they haven’t been successful as yet T T'. , ■ fcfe' Oxygen-acetyline apparatus has been used to separate—“cut up”—the steel an'd iron of the ship where it was necessary to remere those tangled portions hampering the further work* of excavation. This apparatus resembles, In a way, a plumber's blow lamp. Only the Intense heat cuts through metfl as a knife would through butter. A five-inch square piece of steel was seen severed so quickly that the operation appeared to be almost magical. The method of cutting away the opposing metal parts will be continued until the wreck Is entirely removed. Incrusted With Oysters. >• > The whole part of the ship so far exposed is incrusted with oysters and barnacles—mostly oysters. Hundreds of thousands of the bivalves have attached themselves to the hulk. The Incrustations Appearing in ihe picture are all oysters. When the water was being removed from the cofferdam thousands of fish and eels splashed and struggled In the tnclosure. There were many of the several hundred workmen employed by Major Ferguson who took home strings of fish every night when they quit work Now, of course, there is nothing but slimy mud within the incloaurb. The work of constructing the cofferdam, and, in tact, practically all of the executive labor connected with the “raising,” has been conducted by Major Hartley B Ferguson, who Is one of the main board. Colonel William Black and Colonel Mason Patrick are the other two. The cofferdam has been repeatedly tested and in several places and, while It Isdthe first one of the sort ever constructed, the oomplsts succees of It has marked a place In the history of engineering. But successful as the work has been remarkable, the cold tact- probably is not more than half flntahed.