Entering the Panama Canal from the Atlantic, one finds the beginning of that section called by the engineers the Atlantic Division, four miles out at sea in Limon Bay, a shallow arm of the Caribbean on the shore of which are Colon and the American town of Cristobal. From its beginning, marked only by the outermost of a double line of buoys, the canal extends almost due south seven miles to the lowest of the Gatun Locks. Of this distance four miles is a channel dredged out of the bottom of Limon Bay and the bottom width of the canal from its beginning to the locks is 500 feet. Its depth on this division will be 41 feet at mean tide. For the protection of vessels entering the canal at the Atlantic end, or lying in Colon harbor, a great breakwater 10,500 feet, or a few feet less than two miles long, made of huge masses of rock blasted along the line of the Canal, or especially quarried at Porto Bello, extends from Toro Point to Colon light. In all it will contain 2,840,000 cubic yards of rock and its estimated cost is $5,500,000.
In the original plans for the harbor of Cristobal a second breakwater was proposed to extend at an angle to the guard one, but the success of the former in breaking the force of the seas that are raised by the fierce northers that blow between October and January has been so great that this may never be needed. Its need is further obviated by the construction of the great mole of stone and concrete which juts out from the Cristobal shore for 3500 feet at right angles to the Canal. From this mole five massive piers will extend into the harbor, jutting out like fingers on a hand, each 1000 feet long and with the space between them 300 feet wide so that two 1000 foot ships may dock at one time in each slip. The new port of Cristobal starts out with pier facilities which New York had not prepared for the reception of great ships like the “Vaterland” and the “Aquitania” at the time of their launching.
ENTRANCE TO GATUN LOCKS
The rafts in the foreground carry pipes through which suction dredges discharge material removed
I. COLON: THESE PICTURES IN ORDER FORM A PANORAMA OF THE COLON WATER FRONT
II. COLON: PART OF THE RESIDENTIAL DISTRICT ON THE WATER FRONT
III. COLON: PANAMA RAILROAD AND ROYAL MAIL DOCKS