Mission X

The uproar in Downing Street was considerable. Just a year after Hitler grabbed power, a new, stiff breeze was blowing across Europe and it was not good. Britain was in serious danger. The country's natural moat, the English Channel, no longer posed much of a barrier because of the new breed of faster, longer range aircraft. "England is no longer an island," Britain's concerned political leaders were saying. The government of his majesty, King George, declared air defense its highest priority. In this tense situation, the Scottish physicist, Watson Watt, came up with a revolutionary idea and set out to invent an air surveillance system using radio waves. His system would be able to identify airborne objects hundreds of miles away by night or day, rain or shine, fog or snow. His urgent task was to develop a shield against the growing signs in the 1930s that a new world war was imminent. Watt was convinced that his vision was unique. But in not-so-far-off Germany, two young engineers were tirelessly working on the same trailblazing concept. The two self-taught young men, Paul Erbslöh and Hans Karl von Willisen, were hoping that their invention in future would prevent disasters like the sinking of the Titanic. Under the watchful eye of the German navy, they were close to developing a mobile radar system. They recognized too late in whose hands they had placed their fate and were overrun by the events of history. "Duel in the Dark" is the fascinating story of scientists unknown to each other competing to develop the world's first radar on the eve of a terrible confrontation. This is a story, full of drama, disappointing setbacks, technological achievement, espionage and patriotism. What began as a vision nurtured by a few individuals would revolutionize the art of war like no other invention before it. For the first time in history, military commanders could have early information in their hands about the movements of enemy troops and strategically re-deploy their own forces accordingly. A high-ranking general said: "The atom bomb ended the war, but radar won it!" Until recently, nearly all the literature on radar gives credit to Watson Watt for inventing it, but based on completely new sources Mission X documents that radar was developed simultaneously in Britain and Germany. Here is a gripping, suspense-packed story about a previously neglected chapter in scientific history. Today, radar is more important than ever in our daily lives. Mission X provides a glimpse into what was once one of the best-kept secrets in Britain. "Duel in the Dark" goes behind the fence of one of the most heavily guarded military bases of the Royal Air Force, where no camera team has ever filmed before, to observe how an innovative radar wall along the coast of southern Spain tracks drug smugglers and illegal refugees. There are also breathtaking pictures from one of the world's most precise radar systems that can identify objects as small as two centimeters in diameter some 1,000 kilometers out in space.

When, in New York, William Kemmler, a man of German heritage, became the first person to be executed in the electric chair in 1890, it was not only the beginning for some of a dark chapter in the history of jurisprudence, but also the sorry climax of a struggle between two ingenious men for the most promising industrial market of the day. The confrontation between the inventor, Thomas Alva Edison, and the industrialist, George Westinghouse, would go down in history as the "Electricity War". Electricity was the magic word of the late 19th century. In initial attempts by Benjamin Franklin or Michael Faraday, and with the invention of electric impulses in telegraph technology, the spectrum of uses for electricity were growing continuously. After the World Exposition in Paris in 1881 and Edison's astonishing unveiling of the light bulb, new electric illumination systems became the hottest technological achievement around the globe and everybody wanted them. Electricity could replace steam to drive engines. It was a second industrial revolution. Everywhere in European and American cities power plants were sprouting up, based on Edison's design. But the limitations soon became evident. These utilities generated direct current, so it was only possible to supply energy to a small circle around the plant. Westinghouse recognized the problem right away. He invested his money into a few, large generating plants outside the cities that used higher voltage to transport the electricity over greater distances - something that was only feasible with alternating current. The competition between these two alternative utility systems developed into a bitter fight. It began with defamatory statements and, from there, moved on to slander, espionage and court battles, finally coming to a head with the public electrocution of animals to demonstrate how dangerous the other's utility system was. Mission X takes a closer look at the dramatic story of this bitter rivalry on which the standard for today's high voltage technology is based. And yet, in laboratories around the world, the next step in power generation is already being researched. In Munich, an international team of scientists is working on how to bring the sun's fire to Earth. Nuclear fusion, as it is called, is a super heated plasma fire of 100 million degrees which scientists hope will be the energy of the future. Innovative super conductors will then be able to transport the generated electricity over thousands of miles to any point on the globe with no loss of energy along the way.

For astrologers, the year 1588 stood under a bad sign. They predicted chaos and conflict around the world. And this prophesy was to become reality as the Spanish armada approached the English coast. 130 ships and 30,000 soldiers were preparing to invade the British Isles. The world's largest fleet against a handful of English ships captained by a few daring pirates. The battle raged for five days and nights until the Spanish succumbed. A new kind of canon played a significant role in their defeat. At the time, the city of Innsbruck in Austria was Europe's gun-making center and the Löffler family were the Middle Ages version of the Krupps. The canons poured in the Löffler foundries were far superior to any others in range, power and precision. The method for forging these guns was a closely held secret. In 1580, a man named Adam Dreyling fled to England. He had learned the art of making canons from his uncle, Hans Christoph Löffler, and now held the Habsburg's greatest state secret in his hands. Spies smuggled him to Venice and then to England, where his expertise was urgently needed. England's queen knew that war with Spain was unavoidable. For decades the conflict had been simmering between the protestant ruler and catholic Europe. Philip of Spain was bent on toppling her, whatever the cost. English admirals thought up a new strategy to confront the overpowering Spaniards. Mathew Baker, a mathematician and shipbuilder, listens to the tales of successful pirates like Drake and Frobisher and builds small, fast and maneuverable ships equipped with long-range, precision canons to keep the Spaniards at bay. The guns made by Adam Dreyling could be the key. The centerpiece of this film is a volatile mixture of world history on a grand scale and personal drama. The inventiveness and artistry of the foundry man from Tyrol is a small building block for England en route to becoming a globe-spanning empire. Film-maker Axel Engstfeld follows the gun-making trail. At a foundry in Innsbruck he has the old 16th century canon cast in the old-fashioned method. The company, Gebrüder Grassmayr, is the world's leading foundry for casting bells. The family business is in its 14th generation, but hasn't cast any canons since the Thirty Years War. What made Dreyling's canons so superior? An experiment for the film and for the foundry.

Knowing the precise coordinates of a ship is absolutely essential for a captain and his crew. It took centuries, however, before navigating the open seas lost its ominous and frightening character. Columbus, Da Gama or Drake - they all reached foreign shores more by accident than anything else. They knew how to determine what latitude they were at by checking the position of the sun, but the longitude could only be roughly calculated. The English called this method 'dead reckoning', and indeed, it was often fatal. The year 1707 witnessed a tragedy. Off the southern coast of England, Admiral Shovell and his fleet were bearing down on the dreaded Scilly Islands in foggy weather. The ships were smashed to pieces on the murderous rocks. Two thousand seamen lost their lives. The government decided to act and decreed that a prize worth 20,000 pounds would be awarded to the man or woman who found a reliable method to precisely calculate longitude at sea. For centuries, renowned scholars had tried and failed to find an answer - from Galileo to Isaac Newton. But no meaningful progress was made until an ordinary Scottish clockmaker came up with a trailblazing invention in the 18th century. Award-winning author Axel Engstfeld follows one of the most dramatic adventures of science which led to a turning point in the history of maritime navigation. It was a discovery of immense importance that would have consequences up to the present day. The key to determining longitude - then as now - is: time! The royal astronomers looked to the stars for a solution, hoping some heavenly clock visible from anywhere in the world could help calculate a longitudinal position. Unfortunately, at sea this was an extremely complicated procedure. The Scottish clockmaker John Harrison, on the other hand, put his faith in the precision of his chronometers. He decided to build a timepiece, the likes of which the world had never seen. In an age where clocks were considered accurate if they lost only a few minutes per day, Harrison built an instrument that lost only a few seconds per month! He was obsessed with the idea and spent his entire life working on ways to determine the exact longitude with the aid of precise chronometers on swaying ships in different climate zones. A relentless race began: famous scholars of the day versus a self-taught Scotsman, the king's established scientists against an eccentric tinkerer, erudite teachings espousing a logical universe up against a tiny, ticking timepiece. This race is dramatically depicted in Engstfeld's film. Re-enacted scenes are combined with footage from the original locations in England and the Caribbean. Ship voyages across a seething Atlantic and archive material intertwine to become a suspense-filled mosaic. An exact replica of Harrison's famous clock, the H1, was reconstructed especially for this film. The world's most precise chronometer today can be found in the United States. At Falcon Airbase in Colorado, it synchronizes the satellites used for the Global Positioning System, GPS. The search for a way to measure longitude proved to be one of the greatest adventures in seafaring history.