Owing to the growth of air traffic since the war and the raising of safety standards for the operation of aircraft, there has been a great expansion in the aviation weather service provided by the Observatory. The weather charts which are drawn four times daily in the forecasting office now cover an area extending from India to the Mariana Islands and from Lake Baikal to the East Indies, in order that the international air routes radiating from Hong Kong may be effectively covered.
During the reconstruction period it was difficult to keep pace with the demands for weather services, but it is now becoming possible to undertake other scientific work, less There is urgently required but perhaps equally important.
a wide field for research in the meteorology and geophysics of tropical and sub-tropical regions, and several investigations on these lines are nearing completion. Radio-sonde equip- ment for exploring the upper atmosphere was installed during the year; the radio-sonde balloon, seen ascending from the Observatory each morning, was at first taken for a flying saucer, but now evokes no comment. Equipment for the re-establishment of the time service is now being installed, but no progress has been possible in the restoration of the seismological and magnetic stations.
THE RAILWAY
Kowloon is the southern terminal of a railway system From extending north as far as Hankow in central China. Shum Chun on the border of the New Territories northward to Canton the route is now operated by the Canton-Hankow Railway, and is referred to as the southern section of that Line. From Shum Chun south to Kowloon, a distance representing 36 kilometres out of a total of 183 kilometres from Kowloon to Canton, the railway is operated by the Hong Kong Government and is known as the British Section of the Kowloon-Canton Railway.
was
which
The total revenue for the period January-December 1949 amounted to approximately $7,234,712 while expendi- ture was approximately $3,650,989. The main source of income
was the heaviest passenger traffic in the history of the Line, the total numbers carried and revenue earned over the British Section being 4,747,746 and $5,991,234 respectively. This was an increase of 28.89% over the numbers conveyed in 1948 which were previously the highest in the history of the Railway. These figures however do not represent the results of any one financial year as the Railway financial year dates from 1st April to 31st March.
Through passengers carried were 1,507,559, revenue earned being $3,115,797, which was a decrease of 939,336
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