New Secret Ray for Combating Air Attacks

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 288, 5 December 1936, Page 8

New Secret Ray for Combating Air Attacks

BRITISH RESEARCH WORK LONDON, Nov. 14. Tn five years from now Britain will 3e protected from the highest and fastest flying, bombers by an invisible, but inescapable, barrier of rays. This statement was made this week by a high oflicial of -the . Air. Ministry, who has watched the development of the socalled death ray from the earliest experiments. . . At tests made 'recently under conditions of ’great- secrecy, the ,ray completely paralysed the. engine of a bomber flying at 'a height of several thousand feet. The pilot had no choice but to, glide to earth in a forced landing. . .• • -'■ / The subject of the ray is regarded as of; great importance in the Air Ministry. For it is obvious that with increased power and more elaborate apparatus this ray must be employed as Britain's front-line aerial defence. “If tho experiments continue as successfully as up to the present, it will be possible .to form an invisible barrier around Britain which will totally incapacitate bombers flying at 25,0.00 or 30,000 feet," declared the Air Ministry expert. " - * “ ‘, .■ - The principle of the beam was discovered,some years ago, but its application to aerial defence was beset with • difficulties. These new rays destroy 4fe in a few minutes. And they are capable of exploding the more sensitive explosives of the fulminate of mercury type. If a machine itself is invulnerable to the rays. the : pilot himself may succumb or he and his machine may be blown to pieces by his own bombs detonated bv rays he cannot see, ,