ROBOT BOMB

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 May 1939, Page 5

ROBOT BOMB

CLAIMS OF QUEENSLAND /INVENTORS. ABLE TO PURSUE TARGET. Two young Queensland engineers claim to have invented an aerial bomb which can pursue a moving target over any course, whether zig-zag or circular, overtake, and destroy it; follow a target around a room; and be controlled so accurately on its earthward flight that one of two ships can be hit even if they lie side by side. The robot bomb, or aerial torpedo, is the product of two year’s research by Messrs Valton Wall, aged 37, and Richard Blakeway, aged 35, of Brisbane, industrial engineers. The idea occurred to them while they were experimenting with electronic science in the remaking of X-ray apparatus. The engineer’s own story of the invention is that since early in 1937 they have been working under the supervision of the -Defence Department, which advised them not to put on paper their plans and specifications, and which placed a military guard on the engineering plant where they worked at night. Before this precaution was taken, the lock of an inner office of Mr Wall’s workshop was tampered with, and the office at Mr Blakeway’s gdrage was entered and all his private papers were ransacked. The constituents of the bomb are a secret, but the inventors claim that it is principally for repelling an invasion by sea, although in certain condi tions it could be adapted for land bombing. They point to the fact that' an ordinary bomb dropped from an aeroplane doing 200 miles an hour 11,000 feet up, does not fall sheer, but must be released at least three miles from its target. The inventors say that theii’ robot bomb, although there is no radio control or magnetic influence determining its course, can be controlled through predetermined discrimination, so that it would score a direct hit on any vessell aimed at. So positive is the electronic control, they insist, that the bomb can be governed within itself to pursue a moving target even though the target may change its course or follow an erratic one. The inventors are disappointed with a statement of the Minister of Defence, Mr G. A. Street, to Parliament that, “while there is no doubt as to the theory of the principle employed in the invention, there is considerable doubt as to its application in actual bombing from aircraft.” They are willing to have tests carried out toprove tha't ’what they say is true.