#meterologist

12th February 1935 saw Robert Watson-Watt sent the Air Ministry a report entitled "The Detection of Aircraft by Radio Methods".

Two weeks later on February 26, Watson-Watt and his assistant Arnold Wilkins demonstrated a basic radar system to an observer from the Air Ministry Committee the Detection of Aircraft. The previous day they had set up receiving equipment in a field near Upper Stowe, Northamptonshire, and this was used to detect the presence of a Handley Page Heyford bomber at ranges up to 8 miles by means of the radio waves which it reflected from the nearby Daventry shortwave radio transmitter of the BBC, which operated at a wavelength of 49 m (6 MHz). This convincing demonstration, known as the Daventry Experiment, led immediately to development of radar.

Watson-Watt was subsequently named superintendent of a new division of the Air Ministry, the Bawdsey Research Station, in 1936. By the end of 1938 a secret system was in place along the East and South coast of England, just in time for the outbreak of war in 1939.

During the war, Watson-Watt’s invention proved invaluable in helping to defend against German aircraft. It helped the RAF win the Battle of Britain in 1940, and was instrumental in ending “The Blitz” in 1941. Eventually it was able to detect aircraft at up to 100 kilometers. Watson-Watt was knighted in 1942.

In 1939, Watson-Watt was named Scientific Advisor on Telecommunications (SAT) to the Air Ministry. He travelled to the United States to assist in setting up radar there as well. After World War II concluded he spent much of his time in Canada and the United States, and he published a book, “Three Steps to Victory,” in 1958. He returned to Scotland in the 1960s, where he died December 5, 1973.

A wee add on to this is that Watson-Watt's work would not have been possible without the work of another Scot, in my opinion our greatest ever scientist, James Clerk Maxwell, who developed equations governing the behaviour of electromagnetic waves in 1864.

This meteorologist is co-hosting his TV weather segments with his adorable cat Betty 😻

On December 19th 1887 Balfour Stewart, the Scottish meteorologist and geophysicist, died.

Balfour Stewart was born on 1st November 1828 in Edinburgh, Scotland. An “intellectually precocious” child, he entered St-Andrews University at age thirteen, subsequently transfering to the University of Edinburgh to study natural philosophy. Bending to parental pressures, upon graduating he embarked on business, which he however abandoned and return to the University of Edinburgh in 1853 to work as an assistant to James D. Forbes (1809-1868). In 1859 he became Director of Kew Observatory, where he remained until 1870, and finished his career as  Professor of Physics at Owens College in Manchester. He was elected to the Royal Society in 1862, awarded their Rumford Medal in 1868, and was elected to the Royal Astronomical Society in 1867.

Stewart's true forte was in experimental physics, but many of his theoretical ideas, though often lacking mathematical rigour, anticipated many later key developments in nineteenth century Physics, particularly in thermodynamics. He essentially established, in a purely empirical and almost intuitive manner, the radiation Laws later obtained by  German physicist Gustav Kirchhoff.  Stewart also held a life-long fascination with the possible link between terrestrial magnetism and meteorological phenomena. He first postulated the existence of a high, electrically conducting atmospheric layer which he aptly named "ionosphere", and was the primary driver behind the study of possible planetary influences on sunspots carried our during his directorship at Kew.

In his later years, Stewart became interested in the the compatibility between science and religion, and also launched himself into the scientific study of psychic phenomena. These, in particular, drew very mixed reviews, to the point that his friend and colleague Peter Guthrie Tait, in the obituary he wrote in memory of Stewart, described him as a "one of the most loveable of men, modest and unassuming, but full of the most weird and grotesque ideas".

 Nonetheless, as Professor of Physics at Owens College, Stewart successfully trained a number of late nineteenth century luminaries of British physics, such as J.J. Thompson, Joseph Henry Pointing  and Arthur Schuster. 

On December 19th 1887 Balfour Stewart, the Scottish meteorologist and geophysicist, died.

Physicist and meteorologist. Born in Edinburgh, the son of a tea merchant, Stewart studied at the Universities of St Andrews and Edinburgh. He worked for a time in Edinburgh as assistant to Professor Forbes, but went on to become Director of the Kew Observatory in 1859 and Professor of Physics in Manchester. He was a pioneer in studying the upper atmosphere. Stewart is noted for his seminal work on radiant heat and also for understanding the contribution of electric currents in the ionosphere to the earth's magnetic field. Stewart published The Unseen Universe jointly with another physicist Peter Guthrie Tait, a work which argued that science was not incompatible with religious doctrines.

In 1887, Stewart suffered a stroke while crossing to spend Christmas at his estate in Ireland and died soon after at the age of 59.

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