Science Siftings

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 8, 4 March 1925, Page 62

Science Siftings

(Br ,Vol.t)

Power From the Air.: : ; .'•' , A well-known scientist proposes to obtain power from the air by having a number of thin metal gas-filled balloons anchored by conducting wires at a height of : 1500 feet from the ground, thus making use of the .static discharge from the atmosphere, first discovered by Benjamin Franklin in his famous kite experiment. . '.-

The great difficulty, however, with such apparatus is to control and regulate the energy received, as at times the discharges arc of great violence. Many wireless amateurs who have experimented' with vertical aerials have found that atmospherics are more violent and more continuous' Willi such aerials than with horizontal ones.

First Seaplane Ambulance.

A now seaplane has been built lor service in British Guiana between the plantations of a certain company and the nearest townsh’p, and has been equipped with wireless apparatus.

The machine lias been specially designed to carry while men who fall ill with fever on I lie plantations to the nearest place where they can obtain treatment. Hither:..) the distance, though little more than ‘-<l*o miles ; lias taken seventeen days owing to .the many rapids necessitating porterage, and many sick in cm have not survived the journey. The seaplane will accomplish it in little more than two, hours.

The wireless 'installation ‘ will , enable telegraphic or telephonic eunimnnieat.'o’i to .be carried-,on with both'ends of the. route. A special wireless station has been erected to work in conjunction with the seaplane.

Colored 'Pictures', by Wire.

A few months ago considerable interest was aroused in the scientific world whcfli engineer.', demonstrated a’method of transmitting pictures by wire. Now, by the same piccess. pictures in eight colors are transmitted and reproduced within an hour.

The transmission of colored pictures is effected by a. m-whed 'resembling that used in printing pictures m colors.. .Tin pictures are sent ova*’ the wire. From one all colors except red have been screened out; from the second, all colors except blue; from the third, all colors except yellow. The pictures are transmitted and received in black and white by the usual proce s. Then, when received, the original colo.s arc restored, and the result is a pictw * that contains not only the three ’ primary to.'crs transmitted, but live other nP.Mnediatc tones, just as in color printing one color plate 1 is superimposed On the printing of the other color plate.

The transmission of colored pictures was undertaken j merely as a laborato. y • experiment, 'but the engineers who : .I'eveioped the process' say that it is fraught with practical possibilities such as the identification" of criminals or stolen property. ; >- : -.y>'■:■■■■■[

- . . < , i( v.< , • /The Death Rocket. .ff . iA new weapon of offensive and .defensive

warfare has been developed in the form of a “death rocket” designed to.throw out a flaming shower of molten metalmiles above the earth’s surface.

The inventor is Mr. Ernest Welsh, of North Ferriby, Yorks ,and his experiments with medium-sized rockets are said to have proved that each shower, bursting high in the air, can. cover an area of 100 square yards, and can ignite any object, within that region. The experimental rockets, it is claimed, can climb to a height of five miles. 1 ’V

The rocket contains a destructive 1 charge of seven hundred pellets, a regulating- charge, a detonator, and a propelling charge! ' When it is to be sent aloft, it rests in a diagonal launching cradle, somewhat similar to those used for ordinary’.sky-rockets. Y lien the fuse is ignited, the propelling charge sends the rocket soaring out of its cradle. Thereafter, at regular intervals,- it. is given'fresh impetus by the bursting of additional charges. . •

For use as defence against' raiding aircraft, the inventor says that batteries of the rockets could be shot upwards in the form of a barrage. The pellets burin themselves out quickly, so that the rockets could be used over a city. - "