Acetylene (systematic name: ethyne) is the chemical compound with the formula C2H2. It is a hydrocarbon and the simplest alkyne. This colorless gas is widely used as a fuel and a chemical building block. It is unstable in its pure form and thus is usually handled as a solution. Pure acetylene is odorless, but commercial grades usually have a marked odor due to impurities such as divinyl sulfide and phosphine.
Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Earth. It has a concentration in the Earth's crust of about one gram per kilogram. In minerals, phosphorus generally occurs as phosphate.
A flare, also sometimes called a fusée, fusee, or bengala in some Latin-speaking countries, is a type of pyrotechnic that produces a bright light or intense heat without an explosion. Flares are used for distress signaling, illumination, or defensive countermeasures in civilian and military applications. Flares may be ground pyrotechnics, projectile pyrotechnics, or parachute-suspended to provide maximum illumination time over a large area. Projectile pyrotechnics may be dropped from aircraft, fired from rocket or artillery, or deployed by flare guns or handheld percussive tubes.
SOS is a Morse code distress signal, used internationally, that was originally established for maritime use. In formal notation SOS is written with an overscore line, to indicate that the Morse code equivalents for the individual letters of "SOS" are transmitted as an unbroken sequence of three dots / three dashes / three dots, with no spaces between the letters. In International Morse Code three dots form the letter "S" and three dashes make the letter "O", so "S O S" became a common way to remember the order of the dots and dashes.
Calcium carbide, also known as calcium acetylide, is a chemical compound with the chemical formula of CaC2. Its main use industrially is in the production of acetylene and calcium cyanamide.
A distress signal, also known as a distress call, is an internationally recognized means for obtaining help. Distress signals are communicated by transmitting radio signals, displaying a visually observable item or illumination, or making a sound audible from a distance.
A foghorn or fog signal is a device that uses sound to warn vehicles of navigational hazards such as rocky coastlines, or boats of the presence of other vessels, in foggy conditions. The term is most often used in relation to marine transport. When visual navigation aids such as lighthouses are obscured, foghorns provide an audible warning of rock outcrops, shoals, headlands, or other dangers to shipping.
A flare gun, also known as a Very pistol or signal pistol, is a large-bore handgun that discharges flares. The flare gun is typically used to produce a distress signal.
A heating element converts electrical energy into heat through the process of Joule heating. Electric current through the element encounters resistance, resulting in heating of the element. Unlike the Peltier effect, this process is independent of the direction of current.
Souter Lighthouse is a lighthouse located in the village of Whitburn, England. Souter was the first lighthouse in the world to be actually designed and built specifically to use alternating electric current, the most advanced lighthouse technology of its day. First lit in the 1870s, Souter was described at the time as 'without doubt one of the most powerful lights in the world'.
Carbide lamps, or acetylene gas lamps, are simple lamps that produce and burn acetylene (C2H2) which is created by the reaction of calcium carbide (CaC2) with water (H2O).
Calcium cyanamide is the inorganic compound with the formula CaCN2. It is the calcium salt of the cyanamide (CN2−
2) anion. This chemical is used as fertilizer and is commercially known as nitrolime. It was first synthesized in 1898 by Adolph Frank and Nikodem Caro (Frank–Caro process).
Kipp's apparatus, also called Kipp generator, is an apparatus designed for preparation of small volumes of gases. It was invented around 1844 by the Dutch pharmacist Petrus Jacobus Kipp and widely used in chemical laboratories and for demonstrations in schools into the second half of the 20th century.
The diaphone is a noisemaking device best known for its use as a foghorn: It can produce deep, powerful tones, able to carry a long distance. Although they have fallen out of favor, diaphones were also used at some fire stations and in other situations where a loud, audible signal was required.
A pyrotechnic composition is a substance or mixture of substances designed to produce an effect by heat, light, sound, gas/smoke or a combination of these, as a result of non-detonative self-sustaining exothermic chemical reactions. Pyrotechnic substances do not rely on oxygen from external sources to sustain the reaction.
The Big-Bang Cannon is an American toy cannon first manufactured in the early 20th-century. Numerous consumer fireworks injuries convinced a physics professor at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania to patent a "Gas Gun" in 1907, and the manufacturing of Big-Bang Cannons started in 1912, from the Gas Cannon Company.
Hurst Point Lighthouse is located at Hurst Point in the English county of Hampshire, and guides vessels through the western approaches to the Solent.
CGS Aberdeen was a Canadian Government Ship launched in 1894, which served as a lighthouse supply and buoy vessel. The vessel served on the East Coast of Canada until 1923, when the vessel ran aground on Seal Island, Nova Scotia.
Point Lonsdale Lighthouse, also known as the Point Lonsdale Signal Station, is close to the township of Point Lonsdale in the Borough of Queenscliffe, Victoria, Australia. It stands at the eastern end of the Bellarine Peninsula, on the western side of the entrance to Port Phillip from Bass Strait, on a headland overlooking the "Rip", a stretch of water considered one of the ten most treacherous navigable passages in the world, and the only seaborne approach to Melbourne. It is operated by Victorian Ports Corporation (Melbourne).
Electrona is a rural residential locality in the local government area (LGA) of Kingborough in the Hobart LGA region of Tasmania. The locality is about 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) south of the town of Kingston. The 2016 census recorded a population of 364 for the state suburb of Electrona. It is a small residential area on the d'Entrecasteaux Channel in Southern Tasmania. It grew up around the Electrona Carbide Works which were established in 1909.
