WALKING ON AIR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21254, 6 August 1932, Page 7 (Supplement)

WALKING ON AIR

LONDON MAN'S CLAIM A man in London claims to hava invented a device no larger than a typewriter which enables one to ascend and walk on air. But it does not provide for a safe return to earth, says the Sunday Despatch. The inventor is Mr. Martin Simsinovici—" Simsy "to hi.s friends a Rumanian, from Paris. Wireless manufacturers know him as the clever inventor of a dry battery and other wireless apparatus. Ho has been responsible for many improvements in the modern gramophone. " Simsy " was interviewed by a reporter, who watched him gazing through his window at the Hotel Victoria on the jostling throng of Trafalgar Square, ""iou see how the people in your great city of London push their way along the crowded pavements," ho mused, " treading on one another's feet and almost pushing each other under the wheels of those giant omnibuses. How wonderful it would be if by some magic they could rise in the air and escape from all that! How wonderful it would bo if, say, a man walking from Charing Cross to Fleet Street could, by the pressure of a button, and with no machinery, without even wings, soar above the traffic and walk on air. You do not believe me ? But 1 tell you I could even now take you to the street, and, by strapping a machine no larger than a portablo typewriter to your chest, I could give you the power to rise in the air—and walk on air. You could rise to the height which you found most comfortable. You are astonished! You should not be. Wireless is far more astonishing. It is far more wonderful to be able to talk to Australia. " My invention is 90 per cent perfect. The other 10 per cent though is the very deuce. How, after making a person rise in the air, 'can I bring him back to earth ? That is the question which puzzles me. Ho must land gently, and with my invention in its present state he would dash himself to destruction. Soon, however, I shall retire to a quiet little village near Paris and carry on my experiments." ICE HOT ENOUGH TO BURN Ice hot enough tQ burn one severely has been produced by Professor P. W. Bridgeman, of Harvard University, reports the Industrial Bulletin of Arthur D. Little, Inc., for April. High pressures are employed to produce hot ice. Ice which melts at 4deg. below zero is obtained at 30,0001b. pressure, and at 300,0001b. pressure water remains solid at 180deg. F. Professor Bridgman's method of producing high pressures is described by him as " simple." He says: " Take a large thick block of steel, bore a hole in it and put liquid into the hole. Then put into the top of the hole a plug which will not leak, and push on the plug. A limit to the high pressure obtainable is set by two things, the leaking of the plug and the yielding of the steel container." Pressures up to 600,0001b. have been reached. The danger of the process is indicated by the fact that it has been found necessary to set some pieces of apparatus behind boiler plate to protect the operators, for such extreme pressures are 10 to 20 times the pressures in long-range guns. BALLOONS FOR HIGH FLIGHTS Austrian engineers recently obtained their first glimpse of the air-tight gondola in which Count Theodor Zichy and Hans von Braun, of Vienna, plan to make an ascent to the world s record height of more than 12 miles above the earth. The odd cabin, with its passengers sealed in, will be swung beneath a huge balloon on its upward journey. The descent will be made by cutting loose the gondola and letting it fall at" the end of a large parachute. Meanwhile other nations are racing for the honour of making the highest ascent. Professor Auguste Piccard, the Swiss physicist who began the competition with his daring ascent of 10 miles in an air-tight ball, plans another flight. Two British aviators are building a balloon for a flight 17 miles high, and Russian aviators are preparing to ascend 12 miles in 1933 AUTOMATIC FIRE ALARMS

Fires which begin in the night automatically set off a new type of alarm, which consists of a short section of copper tubing divided into two chambers and sealed at the ends. The chambers are filled with a mildly explosive composition. Heat from a fire explodes the mixture, blowing out each end of the tubing in succession with a loud report that will awaken a sleeper anywhere in the house.