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Show Landing Planes in Blinding For With Television New Patent Claims to Flash View of Airport WASHINGTON. How television tele-vision may eliminate many of the hazards of blind landings in even the densest fog and blackest black-est night by figuratively providing provid-ing the pilot with fog and night-piercing night-piercing "eyes," is revealed in a United States patent granted to John Hays Hammond, Jr., noted for his inventions of navigational guide systems, and son of the famous fa-mous mining engineer. Bridging the fog-filled gap between be-tween plane and airport, radio waves traveling with the speed of light carry a picture of the landing land-ing field to the pilot, simultaneously simultaneous-ly with data of the exact position of his plane over it, the direction of his flight, his altitude, wind velocity ve-locity and wind direction all the data he needs for a safe landing. How It Works. The sending of the picture Is accomplished ac-complished with the aid of television tele-vision which some experts say will be here on an every day basis within with-in two to five years. Here briefly is how the Inventor's patented system does it: As the airplane approaches the field, it sends out radio signals. These, or the roar of the plane's propellers, are picked up on the landing field by delicate direction finders, like those used by armies to detect and trace the position and direction of flight of enemy planes. The direction finders, operating complicated mechanism, trace this information by means of a tiny light bulb, which moves over a photograph pho-tograph or facsimile of the airport and the surrounding landscape with its hills, river, forest, high chimneys chim-neys and church steeples. At any instant the position of the light bulb on the facsimile Indicates the exact position of a plane over the field while an arrow hooked up with the bulb points In the direction direc-tion of flight. Picture Appears on Panel. A television transmitter now televises tel-evises the whole picture from the airport via radio waves to the pilot, pi-lot, together with the other data already al-ready mentioned. This picture appears ap-pears before him on the television receiver attached to the instrument panel of the plane. The aviator, therefore, will always have In front of him a view of the landing field and the surrounding country with a bright spot of light Indicating the position of his plane over the field. |