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Show ; NAUTICAL :- .: NOVELTIES . 1 Interesting- facts and figures concerning con-cerning the Panama Canal, submitted by the U. S. Navy recruiting station at Salt Lake City: By building Gatun dam across the valley of the Chagre, Gatun lake was formed. It floods a great part of the valley and backs up against the Continental Con-tinental divide. Its surface is 85 feet above the level of the sea, at normal elevation, which made it possible to reduce by 85 feet the depth of the entire en-tire cutting necessary to make the channel between Gatun and Pedro Miguel, a distance of 31 3-4 miles. The passage between the Atlantic ocean and Gatun lake is made by the three steps at Gatun locks. On the ; Pacific side the passage between the 'summit level' (Gatun lake level) and the Pacific is made by means of Pedro Pe-dro Miguel lock, Miraflores lake, and Miraf lores locks. A set of 3 locks, to make the whole step at one time, would have been built on the Pacific side if it had been practicable to se-'cure se-'cure a site affording a firm rock foundation large enough to accomodate accomo-date them. Gatun locks, including the approach walls, are 4 1-5 miles long; Pedro Miguel lock, 5-6 of a mile; Miraflores ' locks slightly over 1 mile. Each of the . twin chambers in every flight of locks jhas a usable length of 1000 feet, a width of 110 feet, and is about 70 feet ' deep. The Miraflores locks have extra 'depth on account of the tidal variations varia-tions in the Pacific. The flights are I duplicate are "double barreled" and ! ships may be passed in opposite directions direc-tions simultaneously. I Gatun lake has an area of 163.38 'square miles with a shore line' of 1100 j mines, when its surface is at its nor-!mal nor-!mal elevation of 85 feet above sea level. It is the largest artificially formed lake in the world. The area of the watershed tributary to the lake i3 1320 square miles. The quantity of water in'the lake at normal level is 183,136 million cubic feat, or 4,204,000 i acre-feet. Gatun lake has 102 times I the area of Miraflores lake and contains con-tains 208 times as much water. ! Both entrances to the canal are protected pro-tected by breakwaters. A thorough system of lights and buoys makes ' possible the use of the canal at night as well as by day. The canal is capable capa-ble of handling the largest ships in existence.-The capacity of the present canal, the year around, is estimated nually. Two large ice plants gBpj the local demand and the ship trri I Thoroughly modern hoU-ls, rests: ants, hospitals and laundries aecot" date the traveling public as wells : government employees, including J ! army and navy forces stationed I the Isthmus. !at approximately 48 ships of usual ! size per day or about 17,000 in a year. The canal has coaling plants of 700,000 tons combined capacity, which can load up to 1,500 tons an hour, as ! fast as ships can receive the coal in j their bunkers. The oil tanks, operat-! operat-! ed by oil companies as well as by the j canal, have storage for approximately I 2,443,792 barrels of oil, including ' crude fuel oil, Diesel oil, and gasoline. The supply of pure water is practically prac-tically unlimited. Most of it is drawn from Gatun lake, filtered and purified and pumped to the towns and cities. In addition, the government operates stores which handle all sorts of foodstuffs food-stuffs and supplies for the ships and their personnel. Cold storage plants j and modern packing houses are operated. oper-ated. Approximately 8,500 head of cattle, maintained on 40,000 acres of cleared pastures, are consumed an- |