27 yards... ...they couldn't fathom it. ----- Original Message ----- From: Martin Vlietstra To: U.S. Metric Association Sent: 2011-04-29 01:13 Subject: [USMA:50413] RE: April 28 Turkish canal article
Harry is quite right - nobody has ever used yarded to measure the depth of water (except possibly dumb journalists) - today's mariners use metres, mariners of yore used either feet or fathoms. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Harry Wyeth Sent: 29 April 2011 02:55 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:50411] April 28 Turkish canal article Please quit dumbing down otherwise well written articles for your educated, intelligent American readers. I am referring to the obvious and tortured avoidance of metric measurements in the "Turkey Plans Own 'Panama Canal' " article. Your writer Marc Champion refers to a planned canal "27 yards deep, 165 yards wide, and 28 to 31 miles long". What the Turkish government is proposing is obviously 25 meters (m) deep, 150 m wide, and 45 to 50 kilometers (km) long. Why do you think Americans are too dumb to understand basic metric measurements? It is a dead giveaway: no one uses "yards" to measure depth in the United States. Another one: He writes of the width of the Bosporus as being "770 yards across". That is a another obvious twisting of the original: the width is clearly just a plain 700 m. Can't you just say so? Please stop this nonsense. HARRY WYETH
