FUTURE AIR WARFARE.

Grey River Argus, 13 January 1927, Page 3

FUTURE AIR WARFARE.

AN AWESOME PICTURE. sl'I'LL PLANTS AND :-L.\l,TI! LICHTS. LONDONfi January 11. ‘‘ In an age of super-things, the trend . of aerial research indicates that we are approaching a new world of surprising . developments, in which huge planes, aerial post offices, and giant bailie, planes and bombers will crowd the/ skies, (si'li flying at i<.s own level t<> | avoid collisions. They will also carry va'archliglits of one hundred million candle-power, sweeping the firmament,’’ says the ‘‘Standard.’* •■The French, realising the immense height nt which planes may tly in fu- ( liiii 1 . ’aii-.e ill- important question of light, have developed the most powerful searchlight in the world and in- i stalled it a; iAlount Af’rique, Dijon, at . an altitude of 19(!0ft. It is of one thousand million candlepower and has eight optical lenses and . prisms. it projects two rays successively, sweeping the horizon every ten .. seconds, and is visible for four hundred miles. Both rays can be merged into one. ami they pentrate for ninety miles. The searchlight is primarily intended to light the aerial routes, but such a development is certain to drive hostile ] aeroplanes to an immense altitude, where, for the purpose of resisting tin' ( low temperature and rarefied atmosphere, the pilots wear electrically heated suits. They are also enclosed in the machines as completely as tlo* crew in a submarine. Night bombers will have a speed of two hundred miles hourly, and will fly at a height of over thirty thousand feet. Great development is expected I in wirelessly-controlled planes, in which television will ('liable a. view of tlit* machines to be brought out, even ’ I when bombs arc dropped five hundred miles from the base. Already aerial torpedoes travel three miles for every three thousand feet of altitude. Therefore, at a height of twenty thousand feet, they can be launched twenty-one miles from the target.