Word: radars
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Privacy in the Bathtub. Radar still has many limitations. Since it travels only in a straight line, it cannot "see" beyond the horizon. Because it cannot see through water or most solid obstructions, there is little chance that it will ever invade the privacy of four walls...
...radar's toughest identification problems-and one of the most fascinating sidelights on the great supergadget-was how to tell whether detected planes or ships were friendly or hostile. It was solved by an ingenious instrument called I.F.F. ("Identification, Friend or Foe"). When an I.F.F.-equipped plane is hit by a friendly radar beam, the instrument automatically flashes back a coded identifying signal...
...ground level, a radar beam is scattered by ground irregularities. For this reason, contrary to Sunday-supplement predictions, it is not practical as an anticollision device on autos or railroads...
...Many of radar's wartime jobs, based on locating a noncooperating target, in peacetime could be performed just as well by ordinary radio. Nonetheless, engineers predict a great postwar future for it. For one thing, they expect it to be required equipment on ships and possibly on commercial planes...
...ship, radar is insurance against collision with icebergs, rocks or other ships; it can take a vessel at full speed through a crowded harbor and dock it in the foggiest weather. In the air, radar, supplemented by a map of the terrain, would keep a pilot as well oriented as if he were flying over his living-room rug, would ward off collisions with mountains and other planes. It would, of course, prevent such accidents as the Army bomber's crash into the Empire State Building last month...