WILL IT FUNCTION?

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 June 1941, Page 6

WILL IT FUNCTION?

NEW AEROPLANE DETECTOR. American inventive genius probably will put a severe crimp in general and German night raids in England in the very near future. The new anti-air-craft device which the British have been using and hinting at more and more broadly during the last month or two is an American invention, and one of the most prized secrets of the U.S. Army. It is a new aeroplane detector of great range and accuracy which utilises a sensational discovery of the t Varian brothers at Stanford University —the klystron radio beam, a very powerful concentration of high frequency radio waves. It was described in detail in a recent issue of the “Saturday Evening Post.” When these waves hit a solid object, like an aeroplane in the' sky, they bounce back to where they came from. By measuring the speed and direction of the bounce, which the army's apparatus can do, the exact position of the aeroplane can be spotted regardless of fog, clouds or darkness. Not only can anti-aircraft guns be pointed accurately at an invisible target, but defending fighter planes can be guided directly to the ] attacking bombers. This (so we are told) is what the British have been doing. It will take a while for a mass production of the new locator to begin, but, as soon as it does, military experts believe that the air power picture over England will be radically altered.