Why the perfect air map does not exist. Air maps have been struggling for years to reach perfection; most of them fall far short of it for three main reasons:

(1) Maps are designed by highly skilled specialists who, however, do not generally know from first hand experience what the practical requirements are. They rely on hearing of these from practical airmen.

(2) The better the practical men are at map reading the less able they are to put into words how they set about it and what is required for the ideal air map.

(3) Map production is extremely expensive in time, work and materials with the result that map makers are loath to scrap a map once made, if it will ‘do,’ even though they realise it might be improved.

At the first International Meeting on Radio-Aids to Marine Navigation held in London in May 1946 some 105 delegates of twenty-three maritime nations met to discuss and witness demonstrations of some of the remarkable advances made in radio-navigation during the war and to consider the progress made in relation to their peacetime uses for marine transport.

At the invitation of the U.S. government a second meeting was held a year later, in New York and New London, to show the progress made in America, to illustrate, with demonstrations, the U.S. policy and to pave the way to international standardisation. The U.K. delegation was led by Sir Robert Watson-Watt.

The mariner has for many years been able to procure charts for practically any waterway in the world and in most cases has the selection of a variety of scales to suit his purposes. The air navigator has not been so happily placed.

Shortly after the end of the 1914–18 war the nations subscribing to the International Convention to Air Navigation agreed the need for world cover in aeronautical charts at various scales, but, up to the commencement of the last war, the 1:10,000,000 basic map, for which the French government accepted responsibility, was the only series to reach completion. Various areas were also charted at scales of. 1:1,000,000 and larger.

Following extensive demonstrations of radio-aids to navigation, telecommunication equipments and associated electronic developments, in U.K. from 9 to 26 September, in U.S.A. from 7 to 26 October and in Canada from 28 to 29 October 1946, the first session of a Special Radio Technical Division of PIGAO was held in Montreal from 30 October to 23 November 1946. The final report of this first session has been published as an ICAO Document, No. 2553/COT/26, and the portions dealing with radio-aids to navigation will be of interest to members of the Institute. The report cannot be regarded as ‘a formal ICAO action’ since it has not been adopted by the Interim Council, and from the U.K. point of view there have been a number of reservations in matters of detail.

There was, during the recent world war, and is still, an urgent A need to provide coverage over meteorological conditions in the North Atlantic, with particular reference to temperate and high latitudes, where changes are rapid and non-seasonal. In addition, and of great importance to the security of trans-ocean flying, is the need to provide intermediate points on the air routes for air-sea-rescue duties and to act, if required, as communication links. If ships can be permanently stationed at specially selected points they can form valuable additions to the W/T direction-finding network, and more accurate fixes will be obtained of any distress signals which may be sent out by aircraft.