. The railroad and engineering journal . mines, as well as to give warn-ing of the approach of small boats at night or in foggyweather, as for countermining, it is proposed to scatterirregularly in front of the ground occupied by the regularsystem numbers of small electro-contact mines. Thesewould ordinarily be arranged to fire automatically, althoughnot necessarily so. XI.—COUNTERMINING. To neutralize or destroy the mines of an enemy resort ishad to countermining. Various means are resorted to toaccomplish this object. In the case of electrically con-trolled mines, the most effective way of p
. The railroad and engineering journal . mines, as well as to give warn-ing of the approach of small boats at night or in foggyweather, as for countermining, it is proposed to scatterirregularly in front of the ground occupied by the regularsystem numbers of small electro-contact mines. Thesewould ordinarily be arranged to fire automatically, althoughnot necessarily so. XI.—COUNTERMINING. To neutralize or destroy the mines of an enemy resort ishad to countermining. Various means are resorted to toaccomplish this object. In the case of electrically con-trolled mines, the most effective way of putting a group orsystem out of action is to rupture the multiple cable lead-ing to the firing-station. Next to this the destruction orneutralization of the individual mines is to be is accomplished by cutting its electrical cable, or de-stroying the mine by attaching to it a small electrical mineand exploding it. A fleet setting out to open a passage in the mine-fielddefending a harbor would provide boats for creeping, for. sweeping, and launches for countermining. Row-boatswould be sent over the field to creep for the cables withproperly constructed creepers or grapnels. If not toodeeply submerged or too heavy they may be raised andcut ; otherwise destroyed by explosive grapnels. Boatsin pairs, with drag-ropes or nets between them, wouldsweep the field for the mines themselves. The counter- l^o THE RAILROAD AND [April, 1891. mining launches following would endeavor to attach theircountermines and complete the destruction. It seems more than probable that the electric light willplay an important part in this connection in the long ago as 1887 some experiments were made at thenaval torpedo station with submerged incandescent elec-trical lamps. These lamps were from 100 to 150 candle-power, secured to the end of torpedo spars and submergedto varying depths up to about 20 feet. The light was suffi-cient to render objects within a radius of 100 to 150 feetdi
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectrailroa, bookyear1887
