50 Years Ago

It may not be generally realized that work is in progress on the colossal project of constructing a 40-in. diameter, 300 miles long, Trans-Alpine oil pipeline to convey oil from the Adriatic to the heart of Germany ... Among the many practical problems concerned with such a project, apart from tunnelling and mechanical excavation in the high Alps, are the necessity to dredge the harbour at Trieste so that it can eventually accommodate oil tankers of 160,000 dead weight tons; setting storage tanks there on piles because available land is a rocky hill site; construction of several thousand feet of piers in the Adriatic ... Involved also in the scheme is the building of five separate pumping stations, each equipped with two 4,000-horse-power electric centrifugal pumps required to lift hundreds of thousands of tons of oil from sea-level to one of the highest points of Felber Tauern.

From Nature 30 October 1965

100 Years Ago

'Distances at which sounds of heavy gun-firing are heard' — Referring to the correspondence on this subject, I have been collecting information as to places at which the sound of the firing in Belgium has been heard in this country ... Here, at a distance of about 125 miles from Ypres (taking that town for convenience, as a known centre) I have heard firing quite unmistakably since the beginning of the war — often all day, and for many days in succession, and frequently at night too. So far as I have been able to ascertain, the greatest distance from Ypres at which the firing has been heard unmistakably is about 140 miles ... Observations seem to show that the direction of the wind has less to do with the transmission of the sound than certain atmospheric conditions.

From Nature 28 October 1915 Footnote 1