Post by KG on May 25, 2013 22:52:33 GMT
25 May 2013
Pioneering Swansea professor's World War II work remembered:
Before World War II Edward George Bowen was a shy, slightly anonymous professor of physics at Swansea University.
But 70 years ago this month, this son of a Cockett sheet metal worker would go on to change the course of our everyday lives.
Because Prof 'Taffy' Bowen managed to miniaturise radar, from a nationwide network of 50ft (15m) tall masts in 1935, right down to something which by 1943 could be fitted into the noses of planes during the Battle of the Atlantic.
This meant that while Allied fighters could detect German U-Boats from a range of up to 100 miles (160km) - even though they were thousands of miles away from the nearest land-based radar systems - the U-boats were unaware of their presence until the planes were virtually on top of them.
LINK: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-22544255
Pioneering Swansea professor's World War II work remembered:
Before World War II Edward George Bowen was a shy, slightly anonymous professor of physics at Swansea University.
But 70 years ago this month, this son of a Cockett sheet metal worker would go on to change the course of our everyday lives.
Because Prof 'Taffy' Bowen managed to miniaturise radar, from a nationwide network of 50ft (15m) tall masts in 1935, right down to something which by 1943 could be fitted into the noses of planes during the Battle of the Atlantic.
This meant that while Allied fighters could detect German U-Boats from a range of up to 100 miles (160km) - even though they were thousands of miles away from the nearest land-based radar systems - the U-boats were unaware of their presence until the planes were virtually on top of them.
LINK: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-22544255