text: * a-ts* v’ ■■■.- - ■ .■■ ■ ' * . "~t~-v~ ■• • ." Csases WMI! < . iIBIHaEj - r ? will I »& .-..a. ■ v„ ■ w B : lOW ll' wl A, Q; 4 4 Hi-;® ■... '>- ; ' - . V l< M|Mk ;. ■' •' < ~ Il I MBSi “ -•■ ' ■; 4, -mil Afwf® Eo4» 1 * ARSPS MfeWipjj AA" - WiME . • 4K «W?W»>'- -" \x.. ' Z W ; /< x» URV-.. .. ■>, ' ■; x - - ; X '\ ' z . ’•”- - - <’ <<«. w« &%«!&&. \ -' "W « z - x»<. -'v . " JI Jh<*' . ■ ■ ’*’. - "y~\- -w| r '?t- “Winter would grip England with Arctic rigors, the Houses of Pa liament would be sheathed in Polar ice, and fur-clad Londoners would hunt walrus on the Thames.** “Our Eastern Coast a Tropic Garden—But England a Frozen Waste IT is the Gulf Stream which makes England. Once let it be turned aside so that it would no longer flow northeastward across the ocean, touching the northwestern shores of Europe, as it now does, with its warm, caressing hand, and there can be no doubt that not only the British Isles, but all Western Europe, would experience a disastrous lowering of temperature. At the same time, this "accident" would completely change the climate of the Eastern Seaboard of the United States. As England grew cold, America's coast would grow warmer; while London froze. New York would bask in a tropical climate; when the walrus and Arctic birds fished in the now pleasant Thames, people would be gathering oranges off the trees in Central Park or picking coconuts from the palms along the Battery, hunting crocodiles off the Statue of Liberty or Ashing for tarpon off Boston! All the warmth of the Gulf Stream would be lavished on our shores. How the Labrador Jetty Would Change the World's Climate CARROLL LIVINGSTON RIKER, a mechanical engineer of Brooklyn, has put forward a remarkable project for changing the course of the Gulf Stream. As a result of this modification, he claims that the climate of New England, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Labrador, and the whole of the northeastern part of North America, almost up to the Arctic Circle, would become warm and equable. These regions would have a climate similar to that of Southern California. So convincingly has Mr. Riker presented his arguments that Representative Calder, of New York, has been led to introduce a bill in Congress appropriating $100,000 for a commission to report upon the feasibility of the engineer's project and the results to be obtained from it. Mr. Riker's arguments in favor of this project are contained in an interesting pamphlet published by him. Unlike the author of many far-reaching projects of this character, he advocates no absurdities. He offers at least plausible, scientific grounds for all his theories. He has obtained The support of scientific men at the United States Naval Observatory and at Yale and Harvard Universities. Briefly, the plan of Mr. Riker is to construct a jetty two hundred miles long from the coast of Newfoundland across the Grand Bank of Newfoundland to the point where the deep sea begins. The average depth across the Grand Bank is only 235 feet. The principal effect of this jetty, according to Mr. Riker, would be to stop the loss of the heat of the Gulf Stream, which now occurs through the meeting of that stream with the Icy Labrador current from the Arctic Circle in the shallow waters of the Bank. Here most of the warmth of the Gulf Stream is lost, but a portion finds its way eastward to warm the coasts of England and Europe, while a portion of the Labrador current escapes, turns shoreward and produces the harsh and uncertain climate of New England. If the jetty were built, the Labrador current would be forced to remain in deep water and would continue its course along the bottom of the ocean to the equator. At the same time, the Gulf Stream, met by no conflicting icy current, would, by reason of its warmth, remain on the surface of the ocean. The main body would follow a course up Davis Strait to the Arctic region, while, on account of bottom formation, an equally large quantity to that which now goes to England would make its way thither. But here is just the crucial doubt and difficulty about Mr. Riker's scheme. Would the present supply of warm water go to England? Would it not rather be cut off thus reducing that little island to the condition of Labrador. Many scientific observers are of the opinion that an obstruction of the Gulf Stream would have that effect. Professor Garrett P. Serviss, one of the foremost American scientists, has expressed the view that the obstruction, however it might be brought about, would most probably have the effect of freezing England out. Professor Serviss’s opinions on this subject are given above. It should be noted that he takes the very reasonable view that if the Gulf Stream kept close to the shore of New England, and were checked at the Grand Bank, it would, by the formation of the coasts in that direction, probably be turned backward after reaching the Bay of Fundy. In other words, it would return toward the equator instead of proceeding in large part to England, as it does now. Considerable indignation is expressed in England that Americans should plan to destroy the British climate and British supremacy by an engineering undertaking to be constructed on British territory. The English doubtless realize that Newfoundland, though a British colony, would probably consent to the jetty, for it would benefit the climate of the colony, which is at present rather bad. Here would be an extremely difficult problem for British statesmen to face. Mr. Riker's project, if carried into execution, might have many other very serious consequences. It might, for instance, cause a shifting of the poles, a change in the axis of the earth, and a modification of the form of the whole globe. The warming of the southern waters would, of course, reduce the quantity of ice in that region. The northern end of the earth being lighter, it would then, through the operation of gravitation, be more strongly attracted toward the sun than at present. At the same time, the equatorial regions of the Atlantic Ocean would become much colder through the great volume of the Labrador current being carried unbroken there. The equatorial countries of South America and Africa would probably have a climate not very different from that of Virginia. The melting of the northern ice would increase the volume of water in the ocean and this by the operation of mechanical laws would increase the circumference of the world at the equator. It will thus be seen that the problem is one that seriously concerns every nation in the world. Mr. Riker's project, which has been carefully thought out, contains many interesting features besides those already mentioned. He estimates that the expense of the jetty would not be more than $20,000,000 and possibly much less. It would be largely built by the forces of nature. A core of rough rock would be laid upon the bottom and this would be built up by Prof. Garrett P. Serviss, the distinguished American Astronomer. For just as England is indebted to a current for her climate so the Middle Atlantic and New England States are now indebted to another for theirs. As the Gulf Stream flows upward nearly parallel with the American coast, it meets the cold Labrador current coming down from Baffin’s Bay, west of Greenland. The current hugs the coast and brings the fleets of icebergs that cross the tracks of the Atlantic liners near Newfoundland. It thrusts itself in between the land and the warm Gulf Stream and helps to turn the latter eastward. Any change, which, under present conditions, would have the effect of turning the Labrador current in such a way that we, the South Atlantic, can keep the Gulf Stream on the map. It shows how the Gulf Stream flows across the Atlantic and the Gulf Stream, showing how a branch of the Labrador stream cools our Northeastern coast, while a branch of the Gulf Stream heats England. The latitude of England is the same as Labrador, and the Gulf Stream is the only thing that prevents it from being ice-bound for three-fourths of the year. Through the depositing of the sand and bottom material upon it by the action of the tide, Mr. Riker has had much experience in building breakwaters in the Gulf, and cites extraordinary examples of the operation of the tides in assisting these constructions. The Jetty should be about 200 miles long, but one only thirty miles in length, projecting from near Cape Race, would modify the climate of the coast of Newfoundland to Cape Hatteras, by which the rigors of the cold Winters, late Springs, coastal fogs and scouring currents would be avoided, and open Winter harbors be unquestionably secured north to the St. Lawrence. "Most of the large icebergs which infest the steamer lane are too large to pass over the shoal portion of the Grand Bank, where the jetty would be located, and are stranded upon them and the Virgin and East rocks, upon its line in vast numbers, for 170 miles, while the large ones that go south pass through the 500-foot channel about twenty miles wide just east of Cape Race, which would be closed by the first thirty miles of construction, and the cost of which would be much less than the interest on the cost of the Panama Canal before completion," says Mr. Riker. The channel over the Grand Bank thus vacated by the Labrador Current (more than 250 miles wide) would be occupied its entire depth by the Gulf Stream, whose position would always be fully four hundred miles further north than it now is at times. It would follow that one hundred fathom contour from Cape Hatteras approaching much nearer the coast of New Jersey than now, passing both sides of George’s Shoal and Sable Island to the jetty, upon which it would strongly impinge with a great tendency to upbuild it. The Gulf Stream, occupying the entire depth over the top of the Grand Bank, would largely eliminate the present bands of cold water rising there, though, on the eastern side, and flowing south of the Flemish Cap (where between which and coasts of New Jersey, Long Island and New England, result in Massachusetts and New York being turned into tropical gardens, while the great metropolis would become hot as Seville or Naples. The effect would be to raise the temperature along the whole Atlantic Coast; Florida and the Carolinas would be hotter; New York and Long Island would swell; even Nova Scotia and Newfoundland would feel the effects and be turned perhaps into Winterless, flowery Paradises! The effects would, of course, be confined to the Atlantic Coast belt, for the circulation of the air in the Northern Hemisphere is such that the great free plains of the West lying behind the Appalachian range would continue to enjoy about the same temperature as a present. The present climate of England is one of the wonders of the world. It is itself an accident. Considering its geographical position, England has no natural right to the possession of a genial climate. To understand this, we have only to remember how the proposed route would divert the Gulf Stream from England and extend the Labrador Current to her shores, giving Arctic winters, while the whole United States would enjoy semi-tropical climate all the year. The end of the proposed jetty there is now, in effect, a partial such continuation under water. It would pass eastward for seven hundred and fifty miles over water fifteen thousand feet deep, practically uninterrupted, until it met the disturbing influences of the Faraday Hills, rising to within one thousand feet of the surface, they being about a thousand miles northeast of the birthplace of the present mongrove currents, and more than half way across the Atlantic, in the latitude of the Selly Islands. Entirely escaping from its second most powerful disintegrating influence, that part of the ice-cold American Polar Current is projected upward under the Stream by the great south toe of the Bank, and elsewhere in its accelerated westward sweep toward Hatteras. It will be in these very deep waters, east of the Grand Bank, that it will pass over the heavier bottom part of its rival on its downward way, and under escort and protection of the lighter and ice-laden half of its old rival, fully 300 miles north of the opposing European Polar Current (which it now encounters head on), it would reverse the center of its sweep toward the pole, delivering its heat to those countries now requiring it and establishing a steamer lane free from fog, ice and icebergs, four hundred miles further north than at present. Its resulting saving in time would be valuable in safety incalculable. The possible climatic effects upon the northern hemisphere by such a proposed conservation of the heat of the Gulf Stream are beyond conception. Referring again to Pillsbury’s estimated flow of ninety billion cubic yards per hour, the heat passing north at that point estimated between seventy-five and thirty-five degrees, would melt eighteen billion cubic yards of ice per hour equivalent to about eighteen hundred square miles of ice ten feet thick per hour, or an amount of ice of that thickness equal to the entire Polar Sea, estimated at two million square miles. In less than forty-five days, the Gulf Stream is the most important source of the Gulf Stream. New England is a tropical garden, Old England and Arid Waste, the Tilt of the Poles, the Plan. Now before Congress to Build a Gigantic Jetty Across the Shallow Grand Bank Becomes a Reality. The climate of London corresponds to that of Labrador and the lower point of Hudson Bay, and that Vladivostok, Siberia, with its harbor ice-locked six months in every year, is nearer the Equator than London is. Scotland extends as far north as Arctic Sitka! In central England, the sun at the equator does not rise more than 35 degrees above the horizon, while in the central United States it rises 55 degrees. At the Summer solstice, the noon sun, in England, sinks to about 12 degrees. At the same time in the central United States, its elevation is 32 degrees. The climate of England is not, then, the spontaneous sift of the A generous sun, but the result of a local interference has been... Nature with the distribution of heat on the surface of the This interference is mainly exercised through the Gulf which conveys a warm current of ocean w»t2. • lantic to the doors of England. The hea t carL^V 0 ® 8 ,? 8 quantity of water flowing in the Gulf Stream -.n'a the ' aßt parallel to it, suffices to offset the lack of hAr and in currenti by the sun in a latitude so far north rt ,A eat directly over thousands of square mil es E ' “ ral ses the temperature equatorial regions. w bringing heat from the MA \ I “All the year round the Statue of Liberty would r * Se rom a hower of palms W& ot h er tropical plants, su/X New Yorker# would /t 7 n hunt crocodiles off the Bat t tery.” I O'Wi '/j/ VsHK 'SO 1 --- - J I t===FS= ’"IT^ITL,H JU 1 f . . ... J| I i/X wW ■'"Wk* .V"'- x . i&fik /»'• f**- 1--- / ’ - if// i- ' v'-' ■ Ik—i- ■e®; I , ■. 