Popular Science Monthly 



Navy is planning to increase the height 

 of the masts to 500 feet and install a 25 

 kw. set in addition to the present 5 kw. 

 one. The new set will be of the Poul- 

 sen arc type, for the generation of con- 

 tinuous waves. The station at Unalga 

 Island has been dismantled, and that at 

 Dutch Harbor (Unalaska) will be in- 

 creased in size, to make it capable of 

 handling the traffic heretofor handled by 

 the Unalga station. Unalga and Dutch 

 Harbor are only eighteen miles apart, 

 and it was not deemed necessary to 

 maintain both stations. 



These two stations are peculiarly well 

 located for long distance radio work. 

 The station at Unalga Island has several 

 times been in direct communication with 

 the United States Navy station at Key 

 West, Florida, nearly six thousand miles 

 distant, although the power employed at 

 Unalga Island was only ten kw. The 

 operators at Unalga claim to have copied 

 quite regularly, during the winter 

 months, many stations on the Atlantic 

 coast, in spite of the fact that Unalga 

 Island is located more than fifteen hun- 

 dred miles west of the Pacific coastline 

 of the United States. Stations in Japan, 

 Russia, China and the Philippine Islands 

 are heard regularly and were it not for 

 the fact that the Asiatic stations use lan- 

 guages other than English in their regu- 

 lar work, the operators at Dutch Harbor 

 or Unalga Island could easily communi- 

 cate with them. 



The station at Wood Island (Kodiak) 

 is one of the most efficient the Navy has 

 in Alaska. This is undoubtedly due 

 largely to its favorable geographical lo- 

 cation. Kodiak is within daylight range 

 of St. Paul (575 nautical miles distant), 

 Cordova (260 miles), and Sitka (530 

 miles). Occasionally Kodiak has been 

 in daylight communication with Unalga 

 Island, and it is very probable that, 

 when the improvements at the Dutch 

 Harbor station are affected, that station 

 will be in daylight range of Kodiak. The 

 station at Cape Whiteshed (Cordova) 

 has been rather unsatisfactory for long 

 distance work, although this station is 

 equipped in an up-to-date manner with 

 a ten kw. Tclefunkcn set. This may be 

 due to a poor location. 



The station at Sitka is one of the first 

 put up by the Navy in Alaska, and has 



Umbrella antenna used 

 on Alaska stations 



151 



done very efficient work, although not 

 until recently has it been equipped with 

 the -latest type apparatus. At present 

 two sets are installed, one being a live 

 kw. Telefunken set, and the other a 20 

 kw. 240 cycle synchronous rotary dis- 

 charger set. 



The installation of vacuum tube am- 

 plifiers in all the Navy stations of Alas- 

 ka, recently, has 

 made a marked 

 improvement in 

 the service ren- 

 dered. Stations 

 that have previ- 

 ously had diffi- 

 culty in main- 

 taining commu- 

 nication are now 

 working without 

 trouble. The 

 working range 

 with vessels is also materially increased 

 thereby, as the amplifiers enable the 

 Navy stations to receive signals from 

 the I and 2 kw. sets on board ships, as 

 far as the ships are able to receive sig- 

 nals from the five and ten kw. equip- 

 ments of the Navy stations, and often- 

 times farther. The Navy has but re- 

 cently inaugurated a new service, where- 

 by vessels in communication with its 

 Alaska stations may send in reports of 

 their positions daily, which are to be re- 

 layed without charge to the Navy sta- 

 tion at North Head, Wash., where the 

 position reports are turned over to the 

 telegraph lines for transmission to the 

 daily papers of the Pacific Coast. By 

 this service, the reports of positions of 

 vessels in Alaskan waters each night, are 

 published in the following morning's pa- 

 pers in all the principal cities of the 

 coast. 



Heretofor the Alaskan station have 

 been able to communicate with North 

 Head at night only, but since the in- 

 stallation of the audion amplifiers, day- 

 light service has been possible to a lim- 

 ited extent between North Head and Sit- 

 ka, using waves under 2,000 meters in 

 length. This is over a distance of 780 

 nautical miles. During the summer 

 months there is but an hour or two of 

 darkness each night, and during the lat- 

 ter part of June and the early part of 

 July, it docs not get even comj)letely 



