THE DEATH RAY

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume VLI, Issue 3420, 16 December 1935, Page 3

THE DEATH RAY

NEW WAR ON DISEASE GERMS. I have just seen the “Death Ray” in action. In an underground laboratory, steel, concrete and asbestos lined, I witnessed '(writes a correspondent of the “Sunday Chronicle,” Manchester) a demonstration by two young scientists of an apparatus which produces rays that kill disease. I saw a test tube full of death — a virulent culture of tuberculosis germs —rendered harmless in a few seconds. A tiny splash of eye-searing white light spelt doom tb millions of deadly germs. This same ray would spell death to living tissue. The two scientists who have spent years of research in evolving this apparatus are Mr J. H. Carr and Mr C. N. Roberts. Every night for years, as soon as their daily work was finished, they have, descended to their underground laboratory to carry on their experiments. FOr years they sought to isolate a ray which would kill germs; but it was the stratospheric observations of Professor Piccard, of balloon fame, which gave them the clue which enabled them to construct the apparatus. Although the ray was invented primarily to kill disease, the inventors admit that the apparatus might be adapted for the purposes of war. “But we are not interested in such a possibility,” said Mr Roberts. “We are hoping to benefit man; not to introduce another way of enabling him to wipe out his fellow-mien. We have never tried the ray on any animals, because we do not believe in experiments of that kind. “On one occasion some beetles chanced to get into the path of the ray. It just shrivelled them up. “We only use a small power at the moment, as we don’t know what the effect would be on the operators if anything went wrong.” The ray apparatus, which resembles a huge camera, was “remotely controlled” from a specially isolated chamber by Mr Roberts, who at the command of Mr Carr, set transformers and alternators at work. An intensely bright gleam of light flashed from a lamp, entered the ray machine at right angles, passing through a valve, the liquid contents of which were affected by the frequency of the ray. Passing then through an intricate lens system, the ray appeared on a silver screen as a tiny but intensely bright pin-point of blinding luminescence, moving rhythmically up and down. Mr Carr then produced a test tube. “This is a culture of tuberculosis in white of egg—enough to kill thousands of people. Watch carefully,” he said.

■ He inserted the test tube in the apparatus in the path of the ray. Immediately the pin-point of light on the screen started to zig-zag crazily across the screen until, after a few seconds, it settled down to its rhythmic throbbing again. “The germs are dead. The fre-quency-charged ray has slaughtered the frequency of the germ culture. The dancing of the light was a dance of death,” said Mr Carr. “The best comparison I can give of the action of the ray is to instance the terrible din made by rasping a file over a piece of thin steel. The penetrating power' of the noise frequencies sets our nerves on edge. If continued long enough it would drive us mad and probably kill us. “We have created a ‘silent note’far beyond the range of human ears, thousands of times more powerful than that produced by the fine on the tin, which, when directed on to a germ, literally shakes the life out of it. “Matter exists because it vibrates at a certain rate, and when you interfere with that frequency something drastic must happen. “The ray, turned on a person suffering from tuberculosis, would certainly kill the tuberculosis germs; but it would also kill the patient. “At the moment it is not possible for us to treat tuberculosis by this means; but when we know more about this ray we hope to be able to put a person in a special room, diagnose the disease from which he is suffering by its resistance to the ray; and then cure it,” said Mr Carr. “Diagnosis and cure would follow within a few moments of each other, a case of “That’s tuberculosis, that was’.” One suggested use for the ray is to render streets germ-free by fixing an apparatus below a vehicle and driving it along' the streets. It is claimed that the ray will penetrate anything except copper. When, these two young scientists know more about it they intend to make their knowledge public.