CHAPTER X 

 AIRCRAFT DEVICES 



Admiral Doenitz had boasted that his submarines were as 

 immune from detection and attack by Allied planes as a mole is 

 safe from a marauding crow c There was a good deal of truth in 

 the Admiral's boast; but American scientists had an answer. 

 With airborne radar and with the Airborne Magnetic Detector 

 (MAD) and the sonobuoys which Division 6 developed, and the 

 improved ordnance which Division 6 helped to devise, they gave 

 Allied planes an effective means of detecting and attacking 

 the Nazis' U-boats,, 



Magnetic Airborne Detector. 



Even before the formation of Division 6, Dr L» B„ Slichter 

 had been interested in the detection of submarines by magnetic 

 methods . In April and May of 1941, Dr„ Slichter , in company 

 with Dr„ Tate,, visited the United Kingdom and there devoted con- 

 siderable study to the work being done by the British on the 

 detection of submarines by magnetic means, Upon his return to 

 the United States, Dr„ Slichter organized a group under the 

 newly-established Section C-4 to undertake a preliminary in- 

 vestigation of magnetic detection at Massachusetts Institute 

 of Technology. This was the group which later was transferred 

 to the Naval Air Station at Quonset Point, Rhode Island . 



With the entry of the United States into the war, the 

 program of the group was expanded and in March of 1942 the 

 center of activities was moved to LaGuardia Field, New York, 

 Operational bases were maintained at the Lakehurst, New Jersey, 

 Naval Air Station and at Langley Field, Virginia,, In September 

 1942, with the work still expanding, the group was moved to 

 Mineola, Long Island, into a hastily constructed laboratory 

 which became known as the Airborne Instruments Laboratory, 

 Still later a West Coast laboratory was established at the 

 Harlow Aircraft Company at Alhambra, California,, For their 

 experimental work with MAD the scientists had the use of a 

 bi-motored Grumman JRS-5 plane. 



The original group working on the MAD project consisted 

 of Dr„ Slichter , Dr„ J„ No Adkins, Dr„ No A. Haskell, Mr„ 



87 



