New Ship Will Remain Stable By Creating Its Own Inner Waves 43
Zothecula writes "When offshore oil drilling rigs are being installed, serviced or dismantled, the workers typically stay in cabins located on adjacent floating platforms. These semi-submersible platforms are towed into place (or travel under their own power) and then their hulls are partially filled with water, allowing them to remain somewhat stable in the pitching seas. Now, a ship is being built to serve the same purpose, but that will be a much more mobile alternative. It will keep from rolling with the waves by generating its own waves, inside its hull."
Mercury Pots (Score:5, Interesting)
Reminds me of the chapter in Neal Stephenson's The Confusion (part of The Baroque Cycle [wikipedia.org]). Japanese mercury vendors try to disable the Minerva (an armed merchant vessel) by filling its cargo hold with half-filled pots of mercury, rather than filling them to the brim. The idea is that the sloshing in the hull would resonate with the waves at the entrance to the harbour and slow the ship enough to be captured (or something to that effect). There's a discussion of whether Stephenson got the science correct here [blogspot.ca].
How to sink a ship. (Score:2, Interesting)
They had better get it right. When I use to drive a tractor/tanker, if you didn't get your 1st an 2nd gear shifting just right, the chemicals in the tank would shift with such extreme force, that it would almost knock your head off. You can easily hurt your back driving a tanker. I can just see a ship getting the wave out of sink and bursting a hold in the hull.