PROJECT DIANA: RADAR REACHES THE MOON
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TO THE MOON AND BACK
​(ARCHIVED BLoG)

The Human and Scientific Legacy of Project Diana

PROJECT DIANA - NOW AN IEEE MILESTONE

6/26/2019

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Taking its place alongside such space age icons as the Mercury Spacecraft MA-6, the Apollo Guidance Computer, and the Grumman Lunar Module, the Project Diana site at Camp Evans in Wall Township NJ, was designated an official Milestone by the IEEE on May 17, 2019.  Click HERE to see the announcement and several photos, including one of the unveiling of the plaque. The IEEE Milestone program recognizes outstanding technical developments around the world.

The plaque, mounted near the entrance of the building that housed the laboratory, reads:

“On 10 January 1946, a team of military and civilian personnel at Camp Evans, Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, USA, reflected the first radar signals off the moon using modified SCR-270/1 radar. The signals took 2.5 seconds to travel to the moon and back to the Earth. This achievement, Project Diana, marked the beginning of radar astronomy and space communications.”

The IEEE Jersey Coast Section, which nominated the Project Diana site for this honor, elaborated in its supporting documentation on the new scientific possibilities ushered in by the birth of radar astronomy:

“Before 1946, scientists observed the universe using large passive radio telescopes that caught and recorded radio waves emanating from the universe outside the earth’s atmosphere. This technique of passive reception was part of a field known as radio astronomy. Following the success of Project Diana, scientists had access to what is known as radar astronomy. Unlike radio astronomy, this technique is an active observation by reflecting microwaves off objects and analyzing the reflected signal, in the same manner as Project Diana had done with the moon.... The success of the project became a symbol that led to the beginning of the Space Age for the United States.”
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    CINDY STODOLA POMERLEAU

    I was just shy of 3 years old when the US Army successfully bounced radar waves off the moon - the opening salvo in the Space Race, the birth of radioastronomy, and the first Earth-Moon-Earth (EME) communication. I was born on the Jersey coast for the same reason as Project Diana: my father, as scientific director of the Project, was intimately involved in both events. Like Project Diana, I was named for the goddess of the moon (in my case Cynthia, the Greeks' nickname for Artemis - their version of Diana - who was born on Mt Cynthos). Project Diana is baked into my DNA.

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