First field test of radar
FEB 26, 2015
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.030906
On this day in 1935 Robert Watson-Watt conducted the first-ever field test of a radio-based aircraft detection system at a site in the countryside 80 miles NNW of London. Two antennas were phased in such a way that signals coming directly from a shortwave transmitter 6 miles away would cancel out; reflections from other directions would not. The prototype RADAR successfully detected an RAF Handley Page Heyford bomber that was circulating over the site. The test was both secret and timely. That same day German chancellor Adolf Hitler ordered the reformation of the Luftwaffe, in violation of the Treaty of Versailles.
Date in History: 26 February 1935
© 2015 American Institute of Physics
