​Introduction

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The Black Beacon is also known as the Orford Ness Beacon or the Orford Ness Rotating Wireless Navigation Beacon. It was an early radio navigation aid that first became operational in July 1929. It required two rotating transmitting antennas, one at Orford Ness and a further one at Farnborough. They would work asynchronously permitting a receiver on a distant vessel to derive two bearings, one from each station. The two bearings then facilitated the plotting of the vessel’s position on a chart. The German Telefunken Kompass Sender navigation system introduced in 1908 used a more sophisticated phase delay dual site fixed antenna arrangement. This system was later used to direct Zeppelins often over Orford for bombing raids over Eastern England! During WW2 the German Sonne system used 2 large 60m 32 segment ‘umbrella’ antennas. Electronic signal rotation techniques were used in association with calibrated charts to provide a very accurate positioning system.​

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