Water in Motion

Some Examples of the Tremendous Energy of Waves and Floods

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MIDASURIDMENTSof the size of waves have now been made systematically for many years, but they relate chiefly to the waves of the open sea, where the depth of the water. is so great that the friction of the sea bottom exercises no modifying effect. A few months ago the North German Lloyd liner Brandenburg came into New York harbor with her crows nest, 50 feet aboye the water-line, stove in, and bearing many other marks of the damage wrought by a monster wave that broke over her bows about 1,000 miles east of Sandy Hoole The officers estimated the height of the wave at 65 feet. This height is exceptional, but not unprecedented; for it must be remembered that the breaking of a wave against an obstacle throws the water to a far greater height than the unbroken wave could attain. Unbroken waves due to the wind may, in extreme cases, reach a height from trough to crest of 40 to 50 feet. Much higher waves occasionally occur as a result of earthquakes or seaquakes. Solitary waves of this character have sometimes been encountered in otherwise tranquil weather, taking vessels by surprise and not infrequently sending them to the bottom. According to Vaughan Cornish, who has probably devoted more attention to this subject than any other contemporary man of science, the average height of the waves encountered in a severe storm at sea is 20 feet, but the ordinary maximum height of the waves in the same storm will attain 30 feet. In a storm of very exceptional violence the average height may reach 30 feet, and the maximum height 45 feet. This is regarded as about

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