Benutzer:Kingofsurf/Geoffrey Pyke

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Geoffrey Nathaniel Joseph Pyke ( 9. November 1893 - 21. Februar 1948 (Suizid) ) war ein englischer Journalist, Pädagoge und später ein verrückter Erfinder, dessen unorthodoxe Ideen schwer zu realisieren waren. Pyke ist vor allem bekannt für seine innovativen Vorschläge für Kriegswaffen, ganz besonders das Material Pykrete und der geplante Bau des Schiffsprojekt "Habakuk".

Frühes Leben

Pikes Vater, Lionel Edward Pyke, war ein jüdischer Anwalt, starb als Geoffrey fünf Jahre alt war und hinterließ seine Familie kein Geld. Seine Mutter stritt sich mit Verwandten und machte das Leben "Hölle" für ihre Kinder. Sie schickte Pyke aufs Wellington College in Berkshire, später auf eine öffentliche Schule und drängte ihn zum orthodoxen Judentum. Anschließend begann er Jura zu studieren.

1. Weltkrieg

Mit Ausbruch des 1.Weltkrieges unterbrach Pyke sein Studium und begann als Kriegsberichterstatter zu arbeiten. Er überredete den Editor des Daily Chronicle, ihn mit dem falschen Pass eines amerikanischen Seemanns nach Berlin zu schicken. Nach nur sechs Tagen in Deutschland wurde Pyke in seinem Wohn-Schlafraum festgenommen. Nach wochenlanger Einzelhaft wurde er anschließend ins Internierungslager nach Berlin- Ruhleben verlegt. Trotz schwerer Krankheiten, dachte er ständig über die Möglichkeit der Flucht nach. Am 9. Juni 1915 gelang ihm die diese mit einem Mithäftling. Sie kauften sich neue Kleidung und fuhren mit einem Zug zur niederländischen Grenze die sie zu Fuß überquerten. Anschließend kehrten sie nach England zurück und Pyke veröffentlichte eine Serie von populären Artikeln über seine Flucht.

1918 heiratete er Margaret Amy Chubb; eine intelligente, hübsche Tochter eines Hampshire Arztes, die Geschichte an der Oxford University studierte.

Zwischen den Weltkriegen

In dieser Zeit versuchte sich Pyke als Spekulant und entwarf dazu ein unkonventionelles eigenes System des Finanzmanagements. Die Pykes bekamen einen Sohn, David (1921-2001). Dadurch beschäftigte Pyke sich auch mit Erziehungsfragen. Er wollte eine Ausbildung, die Neugier fördert und zukunftsorientiert war. Im Oktober 1924 gründete er dafür ein Schule "Malting House School"in seiner Heimat Cambridge die er mit seinen Spekulationsgewinnen finanzierte.Die Malting House School basierte auf den Theorien des amerikanischen Philosophen und Pädagogen John Dewey. Es förderte die individuelle Entwicklung der Kinder und gab Ihnen große Freiheit. Die Lehrer waren Beobachter der Kinder, die als kleine Forscher gesehen wurden. 1927 ging Pyke pleite und die Schule musste schließen. Margaret Pyke und Geoffrey trennten, sich wurden aber nie geschieden. Er begann unter Depression und seinen riesige Schulden zu leiden.

Zweiter Weltkrieg

Militärische Erfindungen

Mit Beginn des zweiten Weltkrieges begann er sich mit moderner Kriegsführung zu beschäftigen. Inspiriert durch den Anblick von Sperrballons, entwickelte er die Idee, durch auf den Ballons montierte Mikrofone die Position von Flugzeugen durch Triangulation zu ermitteln.

Operation Plough

ein Prototyp des Weasel

der M29 Weasel

Mit der Invasion Norwegens, erkannte er das Problem des schnellen Transportes von Soldaten über Schnee. Er schlug die Entwicklung einer auf einem alten Patent basierenden sogenannten Armstead Schnee Motors vor. Diese bestand aus einem Paar spiralförmiger Zylinder , die sich in den Schnee eingraben und das Fahrzeug vorwärts bewegen. Zunächst wurde Pyke Idee abgelehnt. Dann, im Oktober 1941 lernte er Louis Mountbatten Chef des Combined Operations kennen. Mountbatten interessierte sich für alle Arten von Menschen mit außergewöhnlichen Talenten und Ideen und stellte Pyke als Mitarbeiter ein. Das Schneefahrzeug Projekt wurde Grundlage der Entwicklung eines kanadischen Raupentransporter, genannt "Weasel". Die USA baute Hunderte von diesen als M29.

Project Habakkuk –in Bearbeitung

AB April 1942 beschäftigte er sich mit dem Problem, die Vereisung von Schiffen in arktischen Gewässern zu verhindern .Zusammen mit Max Perutz Cambridge entwickelte er Lösungsvorschläge, die er Mountbatten vorlegte. Am bekanntesten ist die, einen gigantischen Flugzeugträger aus mit Holzfasern verstärktem Eis zu bauen. Während herkömmliche Flugzeugträger nur auf relativ kleine, spezialisierte Flugzeuge beschränkt waren, könnten von dem Riesen konventionellen Jäger und Bomber starten.

Mountbatten read the first few pages and skimmed through the rest of the document. He did not have time to read it thoroughly, but instead handed it to Brigadier Wildman-Lushington somewhat earlier than Pyke might have wished. Lushington, with the assistance of JD Bernal, concluded that Pyke's main proposals were feasible.Vorlage:Sfn

In December 1942, Prime Minister Churchill issued a directive that research on the project should be pressed forward with the highest priority and he expressed the opinion that nature be allowed to do as much of the work as possible.Vorlage:Sfn The Fleet Air Arm required a freeboard of at least Vorlage:Convert for the operation of aircraft and the normally land-based fighters and bombers to be flown off the berg ship required a runway Vorlage:Convert long and Vorlage:Convert wide. It soon became clear that ice cut from natural ice floes would not be suitable because the ice was too thinVorlage:Spaced ndashrarely exceeding Vorlage:ConvertVorlage:Spaced ndashand icebergs were unsuitable because their surface above water was too small.Vorlage:Sfn Experiments to determine the mechanical strength of ice were made in the UK and in Canada, the results were disappointing as ice was found to be an unreliable structural material, using it in the manner suggested would be dangerous.Vorlage:Sfn

In February 1943, the prospects of the project were transformed. Pyke had learned from a report by Herman Mark and his assistant Walter Holenstein that ice made from water mixed with wood fibres formed a strong solid mass – very much stronger than pure water ice.Vorlage:Sfn Mark had been in Vienna, but had by 1940 escaped from Nazi Europe to USA. Scientists working for Pyke at the Brooklyn Polytechnic's Cold Research Laboratory experimented with mixtures of between 4 and 14% wood pulp and their initial tests gave fantastic results. The composition was at first known as piccolite and was later called pykrete.Vorlage:Sfn Pyke handed Herman Mark's report to Max Perutz (who had been a student of Physical chemistry under Mark in Vienna), who developed the pykrete idea in a requisitioned meat store at Smithfield Market. In a series of experiments, he confirmed Mark's results and found that ice made with as little as 4% wood pulp was, weight for weight, as strong as concrete.Vorlage:Sfn

Mountbatten's reaction to the breakthrough is recorded by Lampe: Vorlage:Quote

As an after dinner speech, Mountbatten's story may have been elaborated somewhat to entertain his audienceVorlage:Spaced ndashthe mental image of Churchill in his bath perhaps smoking one of his trademark cigars is rather amusingVorlage:Spaced ndashand the incident may have been entirely imaginary. The story does, however, convey the sense of excitement generated by the discovery.

The project to build a giant aircraft carrier of pykrete was known as Project Habakkuk.

As plans for the great ship evolved, it soon became apparent that the requirement for a Vorlage:Convert freeboard could only be achieved with a hollow vessel: a solid mass of pykrete would have had an unfeasibly deep draft. Even so, a ship Vorlage:Convert long and Vorlage:Convert wide with Vorlage:Convert thick walls would require a draft of Vorlage:Convert and would displace 2,200,000 tons. Its construction, from an untried material, would be a quite staggering undertaking. For the sake of simplicity, the ship was given the shape of a hollow square beam with bevelled edges to reduce drag and the outside walls were to be surrounded by a waterproof insulating skin.Vorlage:Sfn

Extensive testing showed that in its resistance to projectiles and explosives, pykrete was weight for weight as good as concrete. A revolver bullet would cause only insignificant damage: a crater Vorlage:Convert wide and Vorlage:Convert deep. From the results of underwater explosive tests, it was calculated that a torpedo hit would produce a crater Vorlage:Convert in diameter and Vorlage:Convert deep.Vorlage:Sfn Pykrete aircraft carriers would be slow, at about Vorlage:Convert, but with their thick walls they would be impervious to bombs and torpedoes.Vorlage:Sfn

Although pykrete was mechanically strong, it would, like ice, slowly deform when subjected to a constant pressure, a phenomenon technically known as creep. Experiments showed that different sources of wood pulp performed differently, with Canadian spruce being superior to Scotch pine; in the case of Canadian spruce pulp, creep would effectively stop after an initial period of sagging lasting a few weeks provided that the temperature of pykrete was kept below Vorlage:Convert. The ship design included refrigeration plants that circulated compressed air at Vorlage:Convert through U-shaped ducts.Vorlage:Sfn

Pyke was sent to Canada with a personal introduction from Winston Churchill to Mackenzie King. While he was away, an Admiralty committee headed by the Chief of Naval Construction sent a memorandum about Habakkuk to Mountbatten. Perutz later recalled Pyke's reaction when he heard about this.Vorlage:Sfn Pyke sent a cable reading: Vorlage:Quote Vorlage:Quote

This behaviour was typical of Pyke's disdain for the British establishment and the enraged admiral tried to get Pyke sacked. However, Pyke returned from Canada elated at his success and by the splendid performance of a prototype that the Canadians had succeeded in launching on Patricia Lake in Alberta.Vorlage:Sfn

Despite considerable work, the project never got beyond the early planning stage. The manufacture of such a large quantity of pykrete was a formidable difficulty and the problem of steering the great ship had never really been resolved. In the meantime, the range of aircraft had increased significantly, enough to close the Atlantic gap, and the American island hopping programme had advanced sufficiently to make such floating islands unnecessary. Finally, modern land based aircraft were now so heavy that they required longer runways than even Habakkuk could provide.Vorlage:Sfn

Pyke's original memorandum mentioned other applications for pykrete such as building landing ships for the prospective invasion of Japan and for quickly constructing fortifications at a beachhead by spraying an existing building with pykrete liquid that would freeze into a thick layer. Many of these ideas relied upon a misplaced faith in the qualities of supercooled water which he thought could be used as a weapon of war: pumped from a ship it could be used to instantly form bulwarks of ice or even be sprayed directly onto enemy soldiers. However, such ideas were, according to Max Perutz, quite impractical.Vorlage:Sfn

In September 1943, Pyke proposed a slightly less ambitious plan for pykrete vessels to be used in support of an amphibious assault. He proposed a pykrete monitor Vorlage:Convert long and Vorlage:Convert wide mounting a single naval gun turret; this could be self-powered or towed to where it would be used. He also suggested the use of pykrete to make breakwaters and landing stages. At the time, Max Perutz thought the ideas were practical and that the preceding research on pykrete was sufficiently advanced to allow Pyke's plan to be executed. The plan was not put into action, but for the allied invasion of Normandy a system of preconstructed concrete breakwaters and landing stages called Mulberry was employed. Pyke's plans hint that he had some knowledge of the Mulberry plans, perhaps through his contacts with Bernal, who was one of Mulberry's progenitors.

Men in pipes–in Bearbeitung

In late 1943, Pyke submitted to Mountbatten a memorandum, nearly fifty pages long, explaining his ideas for a solution to the problem of unloading stores from ships where no proper port facilities are available and few roads inland. This circumstance was common in the Pacific war theatre and fundamental to the 1943 decision to invade France by landing on the beaches of Normandy, with no harbours and a 24-foot tide. Pyke's idea was to use pipes of the type that were used to transport fuel from ship to shore, to move sealed containers that would contain any type of sufficiently small material objects. Pyke suggested that Vorlage:Convert pipes would handle smaller equipment and larger objects could be passed through two-foot pipes. Furthermore, there was no reason why the pipes should stop at the shore, they could be extended inland as required. Bernal gave a cautious endorsement to the idea, adding that it would require a great deal of investigation.Vorlage:Sfn Pyke's idea was similar to the cleaning brushes that are sometimes forced along pipes by the pressure of the fluid and to the pipeline pigs which today are used for cleaning and telemetry.

A little later, Pyke proposed, tentatively, that his idea for "Power-Driven Rivers" could be extended to the transport of personnel. The pipes would need to be at least two feet in diameter and the pressures would have to be high. He worked out some rough ideas for supplying the passengers with oxygen and suggested that the problem of claustrophobia might be ameliorated by travelling in pairs and by the judicious use of barbiturate drugs.Vorlage:Sfn Vorlage:Quote

Pyke proposed that this system could be used to move people from ship to shore, from island to island, through swamps and over mountains – anywhere where conventional transport was difficult.Vorlage:Sfn

The idea was never taken up. Pyke did not appreciate that it was not practicable to construct a pipeline without first building a road, and a pipeline would be militarily very vulnerable. The practical problems of the Normandy Landings were solved by Royal Navy researchers, who built floating concrete caissons (Mulberries) and floating pontoons (Swiss Roll) along which trucks could drive from ship to shore, as described in Gerald Pawle's book The Secret War (1957).

After World War II–in Bearbeitung

Pyke continued his flow of ideas to make a better world. One suggestion for the problems of energy-starved post-war Europe was to propel railway wagons by human muscle power – employing 20 to 30 men on bicycle-like mechanisms to pedal a cyclo-tractor. Pyke reasoned that the energy in a pound of sugar cost about the same as an equivalent energy in the form of coal and that while Europe had plenty of sugar and unemployed people, there was a shortage of coal and oil. He recognised that such a use of human muscle power was in some ways distasteful, but he could not see that the logic of arguments about calories and coal were unlikely to be sufficiently persuasive.

Pyke was given a commission to look into the problems of the National Health Service and, characteristically, made his contribution as a part of a minority report. He remained eager to convey his unconventional ideas, he wrote and broadcast. He campaigned against the death penalty, and for government support of UNICEF But the more he thought about trying to achieve a better world, the more pessimistic he became – it seemed that human nature was antithetical to innovation in general and his ideas in particular. He was widely mocked in the media of the time, even in left-wing publications. A sense of gloom overtook him.Vorlage:Sfn

Death and legacy –in Bearbeitung

On the evening of Saturday 21 February 1948 in Steele's Road, Hampstead, Pyke shaved his beard and consumed a bottleful of sleeping pills. His landlady found his body the following Monday morning.Vorlage:SfnVorlage:Sfn The coroner gave a verdict of suicide at a moment of mental unbalance. Immediately before consuming the pills, he had written some private letters that made it clear that his death was premeditated.Vorlage:Sfn An obituary in The Times praised him and lamented his passing, beginning with the words: Vorlage:Quote

John Bernal, who knew Pyke well, wrote: Vorlage:Quote

Bibliography

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• Max Perutz: A Description of the Iceberg Aircraft Carrier and the Bearing of the Mechanical Properties of Frozen Wood Pulp upon Some Problems of Glacier Flow. In: The Journal of Glaciology. I. Jahrgang, Nr. 3, 1948, S. 95–104. 
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• Laura Cameron: Science, nature, and hatred: 'finding out' at the Malting House Garden School, 1924–29. In: Society and Space. 24. Jahrgang. Environment and Planning, 2006, S. 851–72 (envplan.com [PDF; abgerufen am 11. Juni 2008]). 
• Everybody's Conscience. In: Time. 8. März 1948 (time.com [abgerufen am 2. Juli 2008]). 
• Trabajadores: The Spanish Civil War through the eyes of organised labour. In: Archives of the Trades Union Congress. Warwick Digital Library; abgerufen im 1. Januar 1 

Further reading

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External links

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