raising ships with ping pong balls

Arne Voigtmann ArneVoigtmann at gmx.de
Tue Jun 18 21:31:40 CEST 2002


Hi Kriton.

> If they are successful, they will have a lot of trouble patenting their
> process, given that a similar process has been described elsewhere,
> before!  (Wasn't this the case when someone was refused a patent for
> his process for raising ships out of the sea bottom, because it was too
> similar to Barks' suggestion of stuffing a ship with ping pong balls?

Yes, you're right.
I've got a school-book about physics where this is described.
In November 1965 the freight ship "Al Kuweit" sank in the harbour of Kuweit.
Several firms wanted to raise the ship, but the Dane Karl Kroyer had
the best idea. He wanted to use small balls of styropor to raise the
ship. Finally his suggestion was accepted and it really worked (it
took six weeks).
But when he wanted to get the patent they refused to accept it because
they said it wasn't his idea but that of "the author of that Donald
Duck story".
So if Barks would have known of this (has he?) he possibly would have
been able to get the patent for this method to raise sunken ships.

Arne.




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