Posted by Dave W on January 27, 1999 at 19:18:39:
Readers of Tarboard may or may not know that there is currently a widely-held view that the use and knowledge of Morse Code is now completely out-dated in these days of global internet links, satellite communications etc.
I think AR/ Nancy Blackett/ Captain Flint would have been somewhat amused to have heard Terry Waite, in a very recent UK TV programme, describing how after years of solitary confinement as a hostage in Beirut, he eventually made contact by tapping messages to another hostage. Neither apparently knew morse code so the tapping was on the basis of the position in the alphabet. Terry Waite explained that on this basis sending his first name "Terry" requires 20 taps for "T" followed by 5 taps for "e", then 18 taps for "r" and so on.
Compare this with the morse version for "Terry" : "long, short, short-long-short, short-long-short, long-short-long-long".