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Show TO COMPLETE FIVE MILLION TONS OF SHIPPING BY 1943 WASHINGTON. A prediction that the nation's rapidly expanding shipbuilding ship-building facilities will turn out 1,250,000 dead-weight tons of merchant mer-chant ships this year, with an increase in-crease to 3,500.000 tons in 1942 and 5,000.000 tons in 1943 came from the maritime commission in the capital city. In its first comprehensive summary sum-mary of a vast three-way construction con-struction program, the commission placed the cost of 705 merchantmen "built, building or under contract" at $1,625,000,000, with an additional investment of $86,000,000 in new facilities, bringing the total cost to $1,711,000,000. Divided into three parts, the construction con-struction program now includes the following: 1 Long-range program calling for 500 ships in a 10-year period. This now includes 233 ships, of which 91 have been delivered. Except for the luxury liner America, recently taken over by the navy, all contracts con-tracts have been let since January 1, 1938. 2 Emergency national - defense program calling for 200 "ugly duckling" cargo carriers. Of approximately ap-proximately 10,000 deadweight tons and designed for mass production, the first "ugly ducklings" are expected ex-pected to slide down the waterways , sometime in November. 3 Construction of 222 vessels for transfer to Great Britain under the Lease-Lend act. This program includes in-cludes 112 "ugly ducklings," 72 high-speed tankers of 16,000 deadweight dead-weight tons, 10 C-l, 22 C-2 and 6 C-3 cargo boats. The "C" boats, among the world's finest of their class, are the backbone of the long-range program. pro-gram. They range from 7,500 to 12,595 deadweight tons. |