ROBOT MAGIC.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIX, Issue 252, 23 September 1929, Page 3

ROBOT MAGIC.

FOR SAFETY OF SHIPS. “No one need suffer seasickness,” is the claim of the makers of an apparatus exhibited at the Shipping aim Engineering Machinery Exhibition at Olympia, London. Voyagers inhaling five minutes before the voyage a mixture of oxygen and medicaments from an atomiser are guaranteed complete immunity. If the mixture is taken after the symptoms are shown, an effective cure is claimed in 85 per cent, of cases. The exhibits include a “magic ray,” and an automatic lookout, which rings a bell instantly any object, even a fogbank, crossep the ship’s path. Other inventions are designed to improve the human element, including an instrument on the bridge, sensitive to the slightest smoke, for detecting fires in the hold, after which the pressure of a button on the bridge floods the hold with extinguishing gas; a pistol extinguisher claimed to be able to put out a 20ft blaze, and a fire-proofing preparation which makes woodwork proof against an oxy-acetylene flame. HOW TO PREVENT SEASICKNESS. No last-minute farewell parties; no dances to bid the parting guest Godspeed ; no luncheons, dinners, afternoon teas; no late nights; no wine, spirits or beer; no rich food; no mixing of liquids with meals; in short, no riotous living. It sounds like a sentence of imprisonment—but it is only the prescription of Dr. Sydney Jones, surgeon of the Atlantic liner Aquitania, against seasickness. Dr. Jones, who has been 36years at sea, says that no person will be seasick in the roughest weather, if for a week lief ore before sailing he “lives a decent, quiet life and takes ordinary dietetic and medical precautions against hyper-acidity.”