PARIS TIME SIGNALS.
RECEIPT IN WELLINGTON. ONLY OF USE TO SCIENTISTS. ’ Wherever there is a wire strung between poles and an up-to-date experimenter in the house, the clocks are liable, to be “right” twice a week, for the official time signal goes out from the Tinakori Wireless Station at 8.30 p.m. on Tuesdays and Fridays, says a Wellington paper. That is not the only time signal audible here if one las an efficient wireless receiver. Various Australian and other Pacific time signals may be heard. The most interesting time service available, however, is that of the Faris Observatory, transmitted daily from, the high power station at Bordeaux by telegraphic control from Paris. This signal comes in at 7.30 each morning. Dr. C. E. Adams, the Government astronomer, has been hearing these signals regularly lately, at the Kelburn Observatory, using only one valve, The Bordeaux signals, sent at high power on a wave-length of 23,500 metres, are operated by the standard clock at the Paris Observatory, and are “scientific" signa'*. They are practically useless to ordinary jiecpie. because they are given in sidereal aid not mean time, for use in conjunction with sidereal standard closks, which gain one day a year on those bv which ordinary affairs are conducted. The signals consist of 300 dots, sent at intervals of slightly less than one second, so that they gain one second in 50 of sidereal time, or one in about 45 of mean time. This departure from the true second enables the signals to be used as a vernier, and a very accurate determination is possible by their aid. The signals are carefully studied by several great European observatories, and each day, along with the time signal, is sent out a corrected statement giving the exact time of the last dot of the previous day’s signal. Dr. Adams states that he has used these signals to check the longiaude of Wellington, which was long ago determined by cable telegraphy. An average of a number of such checkings shows lhat the longitude as hitherto laid down is not more than .07 second of arc oul-—a remarkable evidence of the accuracy of the early determination. The error is less than 5'L
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Taranaki Daily News, 30 December 1922, Page 5
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367PARIS TIME SIGNALS. Taranaki Daily News, 30 December 1922, Page 5
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