AERONAUTICS: Fog Eye

Weather hazard in aviation has been overcome by radio to the extent of: 1) warning the pilot of conditions ahead; 2) guiding him to a point above his destination. Yet many an accident has occurred because the airport was obscured by fog. This problem—to land an airplane where the pilot cannot see—has been the subject of extensive experiment with highly sensitized altimeters (TIME, Oct. 7) and with auditory radio signals. Last week in Gloucester, Mass., a new line of attack, by which the pilot “sees” the hidden field, was announced by John Hays Hammond Jr., inventor famed for researches in radio. The Hammond plan employs three radio compass stations, a television transmitting station and a minutely accurate model of the airport. Continuous radio signals from an incoming airplane would be caught by the direction-finders of the radio stations which would automatically transmit the plane’s triangulated position to the television station. There, suspended above the airport-model would be a television “eye” (corresponding roughly to a radio microphone) controlled by three movable arms which are actuated by the direction-finders. Thus the relative position of “eye” to model airport is always the position of the plane over the actual airport. By television, the view of the model airport is transmitted to a small screen in the pilot’s cockpit. The mechanical eye registers itself on the screen as a moving speck. That speck, the pilot knows, represents his plane, which he may guide safely over trees, fences, hangars, just as they appear on the screen. Elaborate though the scheme sounded, skeptics forbore scoffing, recalling Inventor Hammond’s previous exploits:wireless control of torpedoes and ships; the multiple message carrier wave for radio telegraphy. He is consulting engineer to Radio Corp. of America and General Electric Co.