by radio to shipping and aircraft whenever a tropical cyclone is located in the northern part of the China Sea or off the China coast. When the Colony itself is threatened by a typhoon, the local storm warning system is brought into use, and local warnings are distributed as widely as possible by means of visual signals, radio, telephone, and Rediffusion. During the year the international strong wind warning was added to the signal code, with the object of warning small craft of the onset of strong winds unconnected with typhoons.
The Observatory also provides all meteorological services for the general public, merchant shipping, civil aviation and the armed forces. The main forecasting office and aviation weather centre is located at Kai Tak airport, and is linked to the Observatory by teleprinter and telephone. As a great seaport and airport, Hong Kong is responsible for providing weather information and forecasts to ships and aircraft over a wide area around the Colony; most encouraging cooperation is shown by the crews of ships at sea and aircraft in flight who voluntarily transmit weather reports to the Observatory.
Weather forecasting is a task of considerable difficulty owing to the absence of weather information from the mainland of China and the scarcity of upper air observations over most of the Far East. Daily Radio-sonde observations, for determining the atmospheric conditions up to great heights in any weather, were carried out at the Observatory throughout the year, but until more extensive upper air information is available from the surrounding region the weather forecasts and storm warnings cannot be expected to be consistently accurate.
Equipment for providing a local time service was re-installed and brought into use during the year.
The Railway
Kowloon is the southern terminal of a railway system extending to Hankow and Shanghai with connexions from these cities to North China. The British Section of the line, which is owned by the Hong Kong Government, is operated between Kowloon and the frontier, a distance of 36 kilometres. Formerly through services were operated to Canton and points further north, but since October 14th 1949 when the Central People's Government took over the administration of Canton, through train services have been sus- pended. Since that date, all passengers have been obliged to change trains while a considerable proportion of goods traffic has been transhipped at the frontier. During the latter half of 1950, there was an improvement so far as goods traffic was concerned, wagon loads being permitted to operate through to Chinese territory without transhipment.
The total revenue for the year amounted to $10,550,499, operating expenditure being $3,812,422, leaving a net operating revenue of $6,738,077. Both gross and net revenue were the highest in the history of the line. Capital expenditure amounted to approximately $6,689,080. This expenditure was incurred in the provision of new rolling-stock and equipment, the principal items being 105 45-ton
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