“The Arches”

This unusual structure was designed to test submarine antennas in an environment that replicated conditions at sea. Its roof held a 93-by-66-foot concrete pool filled with seawater, six inches deep except for a central well about eighteen feet deep, while researchers conducted tests and collected data in a control room beneath the pool. Three tall overhead arches were made of wood to minimize radio-frequency reflections that could cause measurement errors. Tests here determined how well a submarine radio system would perform when communicating with satellites or the shore by placing an antenna in the pool's well to simulate a submarine at sea and moving a transmitting antenna on a carriage up the middle arch to simulate positions from the horizon to directly overhead. Researchers measured the radio frequency signals generated between the two antennas to determine how well the submarine antenna functioned. The two side arches served only as supports, and when the structure was dismantled in 1997, they were reused in Newport, Rhode Island, for a new antenna over-water test facility at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center.

New London, Connecticut · United States