CQD
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- This article is about radio distress signal. For people looking for Close Quarters Defense see Close quarters battle.
CQD, transmitted in Morse code as - · - · - - · - - · · is believed to be the first distress signal adopted for radio use. It was announced on January 7, 1904 by "Circular 57" of the Marconi International Marine Communication Company, and became effective, for Marconi installations, beginning February 1, 1904. (Radio at this time was generally called "wireless telegraphy".)
The letters CQ sound phonetically very much like the phrase "seek you" and are still used today by amateur radio operators as a means of initiating contact with others. Land telegraphs had traditionally used "CQ" to identify messages of interest to all stations along a telegraph line, and CQ had also been adopted as a "general call" for maritime radio use. However, in landline usage there was no general emergency signal, so the Marconi company added a "D" -- generally thought to have stood for "distress" -- to CQ in order to create its distress call. Therefore, the full meaning of "CQD" was along the lines of "Seek You--Distress" or "Attention All Stations--Distress". Contrary to popular belief, CQD does not stand for either "Come Quick, Danger" or "Come Quick, Dammit!"; these are backronyms.
Although used worldwide by Marconi operators, CQD was never adopted as an international standard. At the second International Radiotelegraphic Convention, held in Berlin in 1906, Germany's Notzeichen distress signal of three-dots/three-dashes/three-dots (· · · - - - · · · ) was adopted as the international Morse code distress signal. (This distress signal soon became known as "SOS". Germany had first adopted this distress signal in regulations effective April 1, 1905.)
In the early morning of January 23, 1909 whilst sailing into New York from Liverpool, the RMS Republic collided with the Italian liner SS Florida in fog off the island of Nantucket, Massachusetts USA. This was the first occasion on which the CQD distress call had been sent by wireless transmission.
During the fateful sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912, its radio operator Jack Phillips initially sent "CQD", still commonly used by British ships. Harold Bride, the junior radio operator, then suggested the new code "SOS" be used, and Phillips began to alternate.
It is a common yet mistaken belief that the sinking of the Titanic was the first use of the "SOS" call: it wasn't. However, the news accounts of the Titanic disaster cemented the new "SOS" call in the mind of the public, and the use of CQD soon disappeared.
[edit] Trivia
A question regarding the use of CQD during the Titanic disaster was posed on the US version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" The question was "Before SOS, what signal was sent by the Titanic?" The question was a $250 000 question and was not answered by the player.
