lU 



SCIENCE. 



[X. S. Vol. XVIII. Xo. 447 



a small steamer for kite-flying off the west 

 coast of Scotland, in connection -with a fixed 

 station on land. The vessel could be ma- 

 noeuvered at will, as in the writer's initial ex- 

 periment in Massachusetts Bay, and the re- 

 sults published show that 38 records of the 

 various elements were obtained at an average 

 height of 6,000 feet, and that once an altitude 

 of nearly 15,000 feet was reached, although, 

 in this case, the upper kites and the recording 

 instrument were lost, owing to breakage of the 

 wire. 



It is probably known to many of your read- 

 ers that at several stations in Europe, and 

 on Blue Hill in this country, balloon ascen- 

 sions or kite-flights are made upon a specifled 

 day every month, in order to obtain meteor- 

 ological data in the upper atmosphere simul- 

 taneously over a large region. In order to be 

 independent of the natural wind, which is 

 frequently unsuited to kite-flying, and to ac- 

 celerate or diminish it as required, meteor- 

 ological kites have recently been flown from 

 steamboats on Lake Constance by Count 

 von Zeppelin and Professor Hergesell on some 

 of these term-days. Similar experiments 

 upon the smaller lakes of Prussia and Russia 

 have also shown that kites may be rendered 

 nearly independent of the wind even in the 

 interior of the continents. 



A most remarkable campaign has been 

 conducted by M. Teisserenc de Bort, who, 

 with the aid of Scandinavian colleagues, es- 

 tablished last summer a kite-flying station in 

 Jutland, Denmark, where aerial soundings 

 were made day and^ night, wind permitting, 

 during nine months. After the termination 

 of this work the apparatus was transferred to 

 a Danish gunboat, and on a cruise in the 

 Baltic Sea the following extraordinary re- 

 sults, which have just been communicated 

 by the director, were obtained on five con- 

 secutive days: April 22, at an altitude of 

 9,450 feet a temperature of — 14.° 8 P. was 

 found; April 23, at 13,500 feet, the tempera- 

 ture was 9.°1; April 24, at 4,660 feet, 38.°3. 

 On April 25, an altitude of 19,360 feet, which 

 is probably the greatest height ever reached 

 by a kite, was exceeded, and an instrument on 



the lower portion of the wire, at a height of 

 7,415 feet, recorded 24. °4. In this flight the 

 total length of the wire was 38,000 feet, and 

 the upper 4,000 feet, with the highest register- 

 ing instrument, broke away, but were recov- 

 ered. On the morning of April 26 an alti- 

 tude of 8,140 feet, with a temperature of 15. °2, 

 was obtained and in the afternoon 13,320 feet 

 with a temperature of 3.°2. Since the gun- 

 boat steamed only nine and a half knots, the 

 kites could not be flown when there was a 

 complete absence of wind. 



These various experiments amply prove the 

 practicability of the writer's project to in- 

 vestigate the atmospheric strata lying above 

 the doldrums and trade-winds, by means of 

 kites flown from a specially chartered steam- 

 ship. This plan, which was outlined in 

 Science, received the approval of the Inter- 

 national Aeronautical Congress at Berlin 

 last year, and an application for a grant to aid 

 its execution is now before the trustees of the 

 Carnegie Institution. Although the German, 

 British and Scottish antarctic expeditions 

 were equipped with meteorological kites, the 

 reports received confirm the prediction of the 

 writer that little use would be made of them 

 during the voyages southward. On the vessel 

 which the Baltimore Geographical Society 

 sent last month to the Bahamas, Dr. Passig, 

 of the Weather Bureau, expected to fly kites, 

 but, owing to the substitution of a schooner 

 for a steamer, this could not well be done and, 

 therefore, the kites were probably flown only 

 at Nassau. It is to be hoped that Dr. Passig 

 has obtained observations of temperature and 

 humidity in the trade-winds which, even if he 

 did not succeed in getting through, owing to 

 their becoming light above, will be of con- 

 siderable value. These observations might 

 serve as a starting point for the work of the 

 expedition proposed by the writer, which would 

 proceed across the equator and be capable of 

 sounding the atmosphere to the height of four 

 miles, notwithstanding the fact that winds 

 either too light or too strong for the kites may 

 be encountered when the steamer is stationary. 

 A. Lawrence Rotch. 



Blue Hii.l Meteorological Observatory, 

 July 8, 1903. 



