New York Herald Tribune
June 5, 1935
Tesla Predicts Ships Powered by Shore Beam
Scoffs at Normandic "Speed"
Sees success for His Plan to Use Stratosphere Ray
Would Light Sea at Night
Says French Liner's System Copied His in U. S. Boats
Dr. Nikola Tesla, scientist and seer whose discoveries in the fields of
polyphase electrical current and wireless place him in the front rank of modern
inventors, refused yesterday to be awed by the record speed achievement of the
French liner Normandie in crossing the Atlantic in 4 days 11 hours 42 minutes
and predicted that enormous ships would cross the ocean at far greater speeds by
means of a high-tension current projected from power plants on shore to vessels
at sea through the upper reaches of the atmosphere.
In his room at the Hotel New Yorker, dressed in a blue bathrobe, blue socks and
red slippers, Dr. Tesla expounded the principles of his fabulous method of power
transmission - a method which he has been developing at irregular intervals from
as far back as 1897. The virtues of stratosphere transmission, he said, lay not
only in its potential increase of a vessel's speed but also in its power to
eliminate the dangers of nocturnal navigation.
Normandie Uses U. S. Cruiser System
Dr. Tesla, a tall, slender man with straight silvery hair, lean features and
bright blue eyes that belie his seventy-eight years, prefaced his prophecies by
pointing out that the Normandie's system of power generation and application was
not new - but one which had been adopted long ago in some of the United States
cruisers. The principle is one of his own invention.
"The Normandie,. he said, "employs an 'electric drive' in which
turbines drive generators and generators supply the current to independent
motors. In this case the turbines are driven by steam, the generators are of the
three-phase type and the motors are of the induction type.
In many respects the machinery installed on the United States cruisers by former
Secretary Josephus Daniels is more remarkable than that on the Normandie on
account of the limitations of available space. Moreover, while the Normandie
develops only 160,000 horsepower, the cruisers each develop 185,000 horsepower.
These cruisers employ the most remarkable engine plants in the world, and I
believe that this drive would not have been employed on the Normandie had it not
been for the pioneering work done in the United States.
"In view of the adoption on such a large scale of these inventions of mine,
it is interesting to recall that I was violently attacked only a few years ago
by a professor of marine engineering at Columbia, who claimed the electrical
drive was not feasible and that it was folly to undertake it.
"However splendid the machinery on the Normandie might be, the time is not
distant when we will have much simpler and better means of propulsion."
Cites His Force Beam as One Way
Here Dr. Tesla recalled the possibilities of his force beam of particles which
he announced last year as a potential defensive weapon of great value. One of
its aspects is a death ray capable of destroying airplanes and armies. Another
is a means of power transmission which could be used to relay immense voltages
of power over distances limited only by the curvature of the earth.
The difficulties inherent in using this method as a means of propulsion for
oceangoing ships, however, were seen by Dr. Tesla to lie in the necessity of
vast outlays of capital and concerted harmonious endeavor by the chief nations
of the world. The latter, he said, would be impossible to achieve at the present
time. A third difficulty would be the task of keeping a ship at sea constantly
in touch with a threadlike beam of particles from ashore.
Dr. Tesla, therefore, suggested that his other scheme, of stratosphere
transmission of electricity, would be a far more feasible means of marine
propulsion. The principles of the two plans are entirely distinct. The force
beam is a thin barrage of tiny particles discharged at tremendous velocities
from a kind of electrical gun. The other invention, which he has not hitherto
discussed publicly, is of transmitting high tension currents through the upper
air, and receiving them by means of a vertical ionizing beam which would be a
sort of invisible electrode. He discussed this yesterday:
Started New Idea in 1897
"There is a method of conveying great power to ships at sea which would be
able to propel them across oceans at high speed. This method I conceived between
1897 and 1899, and in Colorado Springs in 1899 I made experiments along this
line on a large scale.
"The principle is this: A ray of great ionizing power is used to give to
the atmosphere great powers of conduction. A high tension current of 10,000,000
to 12,000,000 volts is then passed along this ray to the upper strata of the
air, which strata can be broken down very readily and will conduct electricity
very well.
"A ship would have to have equipment for producing a similar ionizing ray.
The current which has passed through the stratosphere will strike this ray,
travel down it and pass into the engines which propel the ship.
Pet Scheme to Light Ocean
"I will confess that I was disappointed when I first made tests along this
line on a large scale. They did not yield practical results. At the time I used
about 8,000,000 to 12,000,000 volts of electricity. As a source of ionizing rays
I employed a powerful arc reflected up into the sky. At the time I was trying
only to connect a high tension current and the upper strata of the air, because
my pet scheme for years has been to light the ocean at night.
"However, since 1902 I have made many improvements in my method which I
know now will assure success. A power plant upon the Azores, for instance, could
send a current up into the stratosphere and illuminate the sky sufficiently for
pilots to discern objects upon the ocean at a safe distance."
Dr. Tesla said that he was working constantly every day to perfect his force
beam, his method of stratosphere transmission of power, and a number of other
inventions the nature of which he was not ready to disclose. When it was called
to his attention that he was working pretty hard for a man who would be
seventy-nine years old next month, he replied:
"Why, I'm young. I never think of my age. Really, you know, I'm just a
youngster.