Popham panel
A Popham panel, or T-signalling panel, was a means of
They were used in the
Origin
The Popham panel, first introduced in 1918,
Operation
Anne Baker described a Popham panel as the size of a "small Persian rug" and structured as a blind.[2] The top of the slats were painted green and from the air, it appeared green when closed.[2] Strong elastic held the slats closed and the operator could pull a cord against the tension of the elastic, to open the blind, showing a white background.[2] The person on the ground could open the panel for a short time, indicating a "dot" in Morse code, or a longer time, indicating a "dash", and thereby had a method of producing a message.[2] If the aircraft located the panel, the air crew could be able to read a message sent by the ground operator.[2] It was aided with a numerical code system, with white numbers in broad strips.[2] One example of a pre-arranged code was "XII", meaning ""come again tomorrow".[2] Andrew Roe described a type that were made from dark blue waterproof American cloth.[1] It weighed around 12 pounds (5.4 kg) and was about 8 by 10 feet (2.4 m × 3.0 m) in size, with a white T-shape stitched on.[1] Branching off were further white panels with dark blue flaps, which were numbered one to nine.[1]
Deployment
The panels were used by the British[3] and in the United States, where they were given to battalions, brigades and regiments for communicating with aircraft.[4]
They were used during the Waziristan campaign of 1919–20 on the North-West Frontier of India along with the simpler ground-based signals, but military historian Herman Watteville described them as "of no great value" in that fast-moving conflict.[1] The slow transmission rate was also a problem when aircraft had limited fuel and had to circle for a prolonged period of time to read the more complicated messages, running the risk of having to make an emergency landing in hostile territory.[1] According to Colonel Hugh Pettigrew, who served with the South Waziristan Scouts during the Waziristan campaign (1936–1939),[5] they were aided frequently by the RAF at Miranshah.[6] Often unable to land and sometimes with the wireless not functioning, they had to revert to using old-fashioned land-signals in the form of Popham panels.[5][6] In his book he gave an account of how one bored base commander laboriously signalled to a pilot as a joke that he wanted the actress Mae West rather than the more usual supplies, and got into a great deal of trouble for doing so.[1] According to Pettigrew the pilot was believed to be Subroto Mukerjee, who later became Chief of the Indian Airforce.[6]
During the
They were still in use as a reserve method of communication prior to the Second World War despite their drawbacks when compared to radio communication.[9]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g Roe, Andrew (2011). ""Good God, Sir, Are You Hurt?" The Realities and Perils of Operating over India's Troublesome North-West Frontier". Air Power Review. 14 (3). Swindon: Royal Air Force: 61–82.
- ^ ISBN 0-7183-0184-6.
- ISBN 978-0-7190-2960-8.
- ^ United States Army in the World War, 1917-1919. U.S. Government Printing Office. 1948. p. 614.
- ^ a b Private Papers of Colonel H R C Pettigrew. Imperial War Museums. Retrieved 14 November 2021.
- ^ a b c Pettigrew, Hugh R. C. (1964). "Guns and things". Frontier Scouts. Kelsey, Sussex: Kelsey Press Limited. pp. 89–90.
the pilot waggled his wings...a sort of shrug of his shoulders. He had not heard of Mae West.....Much much later, when in Delhi I heard that an Indian called Mukerjee had been made chief of the Indian Air Force. I believe he was the pilot of the Wapiti
- ^ a b c Salmond, Sir Geoffrey (1929). Report on the Air Operations in Afghanistan Between December 12th, 1928, and February 25th, 1929. pp. 12–15.
- ISSN 1463-6298.
- ISBN 978-1-137-54416-2.
External links
- Media related to Popham panels at Wikimedia Commons