OCR Text |
Show Blind Flying Aid Devised For Planes The cone of stlance, a dead space directly ' above the transmitting towers of a radio range beacon and the one indication to an airman following fol-lowing a radio beam and endeavoring to orient himself that he is directly over the sending station, may now be identified in the pilot's cockpit by a red light on the instrument board as he passes through this zone. Eugene L. Vidal, director of air commerce has announced that D. M. Stuart, radio engineer of the bureau of air commerce, has developed a method of identifying this imporant land fall to' a pilot flvinir' blind and j who needs to know the whereabouts of the radio' beam transmitter before I he can determine the location of the i airport. Rex Martin, assistant director of air commerce in charge of air navigation, navi-gation, stated that some pilots have confused the cessation of the beacon signals received through the headphones head-phones in mountainous country with ; the cone of silence and also at times they have had difficulty locating this ' dead spot when static was heavy. ' Mr. Stuart, who recently was em-1 em-1 ployed by the bureau of air com-! com-! merce, rectified this condition by building a. high frequency transmitter transmit-ter which projects a vertical beam in the cone of silence area. To receive this special beam or signal the airplane air-plane need, add only a small, light, .compact receiver which is constantly tuned to but one frequency and will receive the special signal from any radio beacon so equipped.- The receiver picks up the signal and in turn lights a small red light on the instrument board as the plane passes through the cone of silence. If the pilot desires, de-sires, he may use his headphones in conjunction with the light to advise him when he has passed over the station. sta-tion. " "The direction and distance of radio beacons with respect to landing facilities are known to all pilot who fly the federal airways," Mr. Martin said. "Therefore, when coming into an airport which may be covered with fog the pilot flies to the beacon, nicks up the cone of silence and -from j that on knows his exact location with respect to the landing field. By radio telephone he is advised as to the height of the coiling and if it is i sufficient to attempt, a landing, he Will mush down through the fog un-I un-I til -he breaks into the clear at , the edge of the field. , . i "This development. has been thoroughly flight-tested in a depart-' depart-' merit of commerce airplane at the : Washington radio range' beacon and ,: is '-so ' satisfactory that we are now considering plans for- equipping all our radio beacons with the special 1 signal and advising the users of the ; federal airways as to the type of re-i re-i ceiving set. necessary to receive "this I additional aid to air navigation." |