Off with a Bang

Between ice in and ice out, Canada's St. Lawrence Seaway Authority turned its efforts to remedying a problem that marred the waterway's inaugural season last year. Big seagoing vessels had such high wind-catching bows and their crews were so inexperienced in the narrow locks and channels that there were 76 accidents along the 27 1/2 mile Welland Canal between Lakes Ontario and Erie. The authority spent $7,500,000 on new mooring walls and fender booms for the Welland, ordered all ships to carry special landing booms, stern anchors and winches. The equipment is sure to help, but last week, as the first ships entered the seaway, the air was filled with the familiar crunch of bent bows and scraped bottoms.

Moving up the Welland, the British freighter La Selva bounced off a highway drawbridge, knocking it eight inches out of line. Three other ships missed lock approaches and ran aground. At the head of the lakes the Norwegian freighter Dagfred won the race to pick up the season's first grain cargo--and slammed its bow into a Port Arthur grain elevator. As one British tanker skipper said wryly: "The season has opened with a bang."

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