Evening star., 1955-02-02
Rodar Chain in Canada Guards Against Sneak Attack
By GeroId Worins
Snaeial carra,nendanf Of The Stur

semidarkness Of the operations
center at radar station XL3,
shadows from shifting light pat
terms on cathode tubes play
across tense. strained faces.
Over the heads Of the young
men and women peering al
radarscopes, a wall poster warns
that 1T Can Happen Here"
The reporting room in this
link in the Pinetree chain o1
radar stations which guards
North America against an atomic
Pearl Harbor is abuzz with the
metallic tones Of intercom con-
versation. Blips on the radar-
scopes, denoting airplanes, are
reported to the surveillance con-
troller, along with information
on their location. altitude, di-
rection and speed.
The Royal Canadian All
Forces radar station XL3. which
incidentally. is not its correct
code designation, squatS in ma
jestic isolation on the bald tor
of an 1.800-foot mountain in
Eastern Canada. Is miles from
the nearest town and rail head
On 18th Parallel.
It is one of an undisclosed
number of RCAF aircraft warn
ing and control units which. in
conjunction with similar United
States Air Force stations both in
the United States and Canada,
maintain a ound-the-clock ra-
dar watch right across the con-
tinent at roughly the 49th
parallel.
I recently spent a full day
at xL3, as one of the first
party of newspapermen to be
admitted to an RCAF radar sta
ton. Superficially the station
looks like a model residential
suburb, with attractive single
family homes and small apart
nent houses. But suburbs are
not usually surrounded by high
woven steel fences, nor do they
have radomes. Three huge plas-
tic and fabric globes atop the
operations buildings on the
mountain summit dominated the
scene. their aluminium paint re-
hecting the bright winter SUM-
light.
Inside the domes, arc-shaped
radar antennas A feet across
rotate every minute OF the day,
probing the sky down to the
horizon with fingers of electrical
energy. When the radar beams
strike aircraft they rebound back
to their source. and are then
projected onto the gridded
cathode tubes which are under
continuous watch in the semi
darkened reporting room.
Station XL3 has been In
operation for two years, and
while it has never vet encoun-
tered q hostile" it has tracked
and controlled the fighter in
Perception Of many unidentified
aircraft. Except for the final
act. the this-is-it order to ''at-
tack target" which has never vel
been given, the procedure Is the
same every time the radarscopes
pick up an unknown blip. To
the radar watchers, aware OF
what one plane with one H-bomb
could do, every unknown is Q
hostile until proved otherwise.
The day ! visited XL3 the huge
horizontal map OF plotting Ia
BILE" in the surveillance room
showed q dozen markers indi.
eating aircraft tracks in the
skies covered by the radar an
tennas. but all the planes were
identified.
you should be here in the
summer" commented Flying
Officer Don Washington, whose
lob as fighter controller consists
of scrambling CF-100 Jets from
the nearest RCAF fighter base
to intercept and investigate un-
known aircraft. Were as busy
as firemen on Halloween. Amer
leans fly in for a few days fish
ing. provincial government
planes fly around looking for
forest fires. and bush pilots may
turn up anywhere"
Responsibility Is Great.
He and other young Canadians
like him, with air force rank
equivalent to that of first lieu
tenant in the u. S. A. F.. bear
heavy responsibility. They take
over when the surveillance con-
troller puts the ominous red
marker of identity unknown
on a track across the plotting
table. Huddled over his own
radarscope in his cabin over
looking the plotting table. the
intercept controller talks the
scrambled fighters to their target
When the jet pilots sight the
stranger, the intercept control
Ter orders them to investigate
and report. If the unknown
turns out to be a friendly plane
perhaps a fisherman who for
got there's a Cold War on-in-
tercept controller orders the jets
back to base. If he's still suspi-
cious he may order continued
surveillance. or order the jets
to force the stranger to land.
And of course for a proved hos
tile there would be only one
order: Attack target The
main purpose of this radar-with-
fighter shield to the north of the
main population areas of Cana
da and the United States is TO
shoot down hostile atom bombers
before they can reach cities and
vital defense installations.
Carelss Pilots Will Pay.
In an effort to cut down the
number of false alarms and
needless fighter scrambles, the
Canadian government recently