Word: sonar
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...Cover) In the uneasy years before the start of World War II, a Navy destroyer nosed through the warm waters off Guantanamo, Cuba. An experimental sonar gadget pinged steadily. It had worked perfectly on other occasions. But here in the Trop ics, it saw targets that were not there...
...contributed more than money. War-developed sonar made depth measurements far more sensitive, giving oceanographers a more accurate look at the ocean's bottom than they had ever had before. The new loran, which can fix a ship's position within a quarter of a mile in daylight, night, or in the thickest fog, enabled a far more detailed and accurate study of ocean currents, and oceanographers launched zealously into new studies with their new tools...
...problems she does encounter come from her very speed. Noise caused by water passing rapidly over the ship's skin and control surfaces can play hob with delicate sonar gear. The Skipjack's forward planes (used to raise or lower the bow during underwater maneuvers) are a particularly noisy item, so they were moved to the sail to keep them as far as possible from the sonar in the bow. Another trouble is control. The Skipjack's maximum depth has not been announced, but even if it is better than 1,000 ft., the ship...
...ocean passage, it was almost like a brilliantly calculated triumph of matter over matter. Perhaps the most striking drama was not the conflict of man v. the elements, which characterized the 19th century, but the contrast between that traditional conflict and the mid-20th century ease with which the sonar-watching, fathometer-reading, Coke-drinking crew of the Nautilus defied the elements. In Nautilus 90 North (the message Nautilus radioed to indicate it had reached the North Pole), the supersub's skipper, Commander William R. (for Robert) Anderson, adds little to the specifics of the polar victory...
...tiger on the scent, Task Force 77 stalked around the island of Formosa. Spread out across the glittering sea were 17 ships deployed around the strike carriers Midway and Lexington. Ahead and on the flank prowled four destroyers, listening for sonar pings. Off to port, screened by six more destroyers, was the carrier Princeton, an antisubmarine hunter-killer. Far to the west, 1,000-m.p.h. F8Us swept along the China coast, their sidewinder missiles inscribed with obscene messages to the Communists. "We make lots of big radar blips," said one of Midway's pilots...