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HMS Unseen: Brits Developing Invisible Ship

Richard
Total Views: 14
March 5, 2008

Stealth ships: HMS Helsingborg and HMS Visby. Photo: Peter Nilsson/Kockums AB

 

The folks at Giz Magazine are reporting scientists at Britannia Royal Navy College are working on a plan to use it to create the ultimate stealth vessel, according to a report in this month’s edition of Physics World.

 

Here’s a excerpt:

 

Unlike natural materials, which refract light to the right of the incident beam, metamaterials are “left handed”, refracting light at a negative angle, to the left of the incident beam. This allows scientists to “bend” light around the object, allowing the beams to continue as if the object were not there. Duke University succeeded in bending microwaves around metamaterials in 2006, and in the following year researchers at Ames Laboratory developed a method for bending wavelengths in the visible light spectrum. Scientists predict that invisibility will be possible for objects of any shape and size within the next decade.

 

For us non technical types, think of a sophisticated form of polarization. For the technically oriented, info on incident beams is here.

 

The original story in Physics World Magazine the states:

 

As the Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War — which, dating from around 450 BC, is probably the world’s oldest treatise on military strategy — “all warfare is based on deception.”

 

Most of us are familiar with the Philadelphia Experiment. Wikipedia states it was an alleged naval military experiment at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, sometime around October 28, 1943, in which the U.S. destroyer escort USS Eldridge was to be rendered invisible to human observers for a brief period of time. It is also referred to as Project Rainbow. The story is widely regarded as a hoax.

 

I wonder how the 72 ColRegs would treat such a vessel or if could be seen by conventional radar.

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This post was written by Richard Rodriguez, Rescue Tug Captain, and US Coast Guard approved instructor for License Training. You can read more of his articles at the BitterEnd

 

 

 

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