Quick Way To Stop Ships

Device checks Progress of Big Vessels In Their Own Length. 

Successful tests of the device invented by Louis Joseph La Coste, son of Chief Justice Sir Alexander La Coste. for checking and stopping vessels under headway were made the other day, says a special dispatch from Montreal to Chicago Tribune. The Dominion government vessel Eureka, 103 feet long and 12½ feet draft, was used. Ocean liners required at least a mile in which to come to a full stop, but Mr. La Coste showed that it was practicable to stop a boat in its own length. 

Flaps, or fins, made of boiler plate were attached about midships to the vessel’s side, which ona signal from the wheelhouse fly open at right angles. Water cushion cylinders give them the necessary retarding effect. They were operated without leakage or jar, although the boat was stopped at an eleven knot speed. Either fin can be opened at a time, and in this way Mr. La Coste claims that a boat can be swung around upon its own axis.

Running at about eight miles an hour the Eureka was repeatedly stopped in its own length by the use of the fins alone. Under similar conditions it was stopped in one-half its length when the engines were reversed.