Tomorrow’s Missiles Take Off (Oct, 1947)
Filed under: Aviation, War — @ 1:30 pm
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1947
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Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1947
| Buy on Ebay
|
Tomorrow’s Missiles Take Off
TOMORROW’S Navy will be ready to fight with weapons as deadly accurate as William Tell’s arrow. Successors to the carronade and Dahlgren gun are such characters as Little Joe and the Gargoyle. Some are guided missiles, some are planes, some are power-packages. All fly regularly out over the Pacific from the Navy’s Air Missile Test Center at Point Mugu, Calif. Each run is tracked by radar and telemetering devices. Some units are preset, unalterable once flight commences. Others, with their own radar to detect and steer for the target, are fiendishly accurate. Command-system missiles are usually radio-controlled; course-seeking missiles are directed by light beams or radio energy.
The Douglas Skyraider shown on page 1 was still in active service through the Vietnam War (1945-1974). By that time it had an even bigger power plant making it the largest single-engined prop plane ever. It could fly for 10 hours at a time!
There are numerous examples still flying around the world and a great history here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A-1_Skyraider
as well as a dedicated site here:
http://skyraider.org/
Comment by Stannous — September 11, 2006 @ 9:25 pm
All of these missiles seem to be WWII developments and were cancelled few years after the war.
Comment by Emcha — May 7, 2007 @ 11:12 pm
Most of these weapons appear to be the direct american developments of captured german weapons. the “gargoyle” and the “KDD-1″ appear to be very similar to the Fi 109 “V1″ used by the germans from 1943 , and the “little Joe” is remarkably similar to several ground based anti aircraft rockets
Comment by Sirscott — April 5, 2008 @ 4:23 pm