THE LIGHTHOUSE

Waikato Times, Volume 96, Issue 15033, 2 September 1922, Page 18 (Supplement)

THE LIGHTHOUSE

WILL IT PASS AWAY? WIRELESS INVENTION TO TAKE ITS PLACE. BLESSING FOR THE LONELY WATCHMEN OF THE SEAS. SOUND INSTEAD OF LIGHT, One by one familiar sights are passing. The sort of railway signal we have seen so long is said to be doomed; now the lighthouse is said to be likely to pass away too. A great blessing to the world it will be if science can save the lighthouse men from their lonely vigils out at sea, and it is wireless, the Wizard of the Modern World, that seems to promise this great change. One of the most recent and one of the most wonderful and useful inventions of the Marconi Company is the wireless lighthouse—the lighthouse without light, we must call it, for it is to replace sight by sound. That is to say, instead of watching for a light, the seaman will in future listen for a wireless signal. In the ordinary lighthouse with a revolving beam the rays of light are reflected outward by mirrors, and the apparatus is moved round by machinery. There is a disadvantage in using light, because thsre are, of qourse limits to the distance from which it can be seen. , Waves in All Directions. When a candle is lit it gives off light in every direction but by means of reflectors it can be made to throw its concentrated rays in any direction. A wireless transmitter also emits waves in all directions but the new invention makes it possible to concentrate these waves into a sort of beam. This is very economical, because the electrical energy flung out by the ordinary wireless station is nearly all wasted, only the very small portion reaching the receiving station being of any use. But the new method has still more to recommend it; it may he employed to warn ships of a dangerous part of tho coast, and to indicate tiie exact geographical bearing of the ship from tiie dangerous point. After a number of experiments in Italy and this country, extending over more than five years, the Marconi Company have succeeded in erecting a successful wireless lighthouse on Inchkeith Island. The wireless waves emitted by this lighthouse are reflected into a beam, as in the case of a searchlight. A Great Future. The whole apparatus revolves slowly, making a complete revolution once every two minutes, and as it moves it sends out a different signal—in the form of a letter or several letters — at every hall-point of the compass, so that when a ship comes within range of tiie signals and hears the lighthouse send a certain combination of letters in the Morse code, Hie operator has simply to refer Lo a chart, on which lie finds, opposite that particular combination of letters,‘ figures which tell him the nautical bearing of the ship in relation lo the lighthouse. It is interesting lo notice , that Hie length of llic cllier waves used for this purpose is the smallest used for practical wireless to-day—only a few metres.

There is, no doubt, a great future for the wireless lighthouse.