He has had over forty years of both practical and theoretical experience in the design and analysis of underwater sound transducers. is President and Chief Scientist at Image Acoustics, Inc. In 1996 the facility at Fort Trumbull was closed and activities were merged at Newport.John L. In 1970 the Sound Lab was organizationally combined with the Naval Underwater Weapons Research and Engineering Station at Newport, Rhode Island to form the Naval Underwater Systems Center. The Sound Lab's efforts were key to the further development of both submarine and anti-submarine warfare. Research intensified during the Cold War, which was as much a technology race with the Soviets as it was an arms race. The Orlando lab closed in 1997 and the building was turned over to civil administration thereafter.īy 1946, the sonar efforts of the Harvard and Columbia labs were combined at Fort Trumbull as the Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory under the Navy's Bureau of Ships, now Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA). The lab was built on the archeological site of Fort Gatlin on the shore of Lake Gem Mary because the sinkhole-formed lake is very deep. This work contributed greatly to the success against U-boats in the Battle of the Atlantic and the near-total destruction of the Imperial Japanese Navy and merchant fleets in the Pacific War.Īlso in 1941 the United States Navy established the Underwater Sound Reference Laboratory in Orlando, Florida. Significant accomplishments during World War II included the development of greatly improved surface ship and submarine sonar systems, acoustic homing torpedoes, sonobuoys, and acoustic mines. The Connecticut office concentrated on passive sonar systems and devices while the Massachusetts office developed active systems and devices. The Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory had its origins in the establishment of two sonar research facilities in 1941 an office of Columbia University's Division of War Research at Fort Trumbull in New London, Connecticut, and the Harvard Underwater Sound Laboratory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1992, the command was reorganized as the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, Division Newport. That year, the Underwater Sound Laboratory from New London, Conn., was combined with the Newport facility to form the Naval Underwater Systems Center or NUSC. In 1951 the station on Goat Island was reorganized:įor the next 15 years, it was the Underwater Ordnance Station, and then the Underwater Weapons Research and Engineering Station until 1970. The Naval Torpedo Station researched and tested underwater weaponry through World War I and World War II creating additional facilities on Rose Island, Fox Island and Gould Island. Acknowledgement of inaccurate depth settings was delayed until August 1942, and recognition of Mark VI fuze malfunctions was delayed until June 1943. Testing which might have been efficiently completed at the Torpedo Station was less effectively undertaken by operational submarines. Newport Torpedo Station's unjustified confidence in their precision-crafted torpedoes delayed recognition of problems being reported by submarines using the torpedoes in combat. Newport's torpedo factory was unable to produce enough torpedoes to match combat use through the first year of World War II, and was reluctant to use scarce torpedoes in tests. Skilled craftsmen at the torpedo factory unknowingly produced a nonfunctional design. Economies of the Great Depression limited torpedo production and prevented adequate testing of either the Mark 14 torpedo or the new Mark VI fuze. Fuze design and production was undertaken in great secrecy for the newly designed Mark 14 torpedo. The Torpedo Station designed the Mark VI magnetic influence fuze for torpedoes during the 1920s. The torpedo factory became a major employer in the Newport area as Rhode Island congressmen protected the factory from competition. The United States Army adopted the Navy formulation in 1908 and began manufacture at Picatinny Arsenal.Ī factory was built in 1907 to manufacture steam torpedoes for the United States Navy. During the 1890s Charles Munroe and John Bernadou worked at Newport patenting a formulation of nitrocellulose colloided with ether and alcohol used as smokeless powder for United States naval artillery through the World Wars. Naval Torpedo Station was founded in Newport on Goat Island, the site of a military fort since 1703.
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