Fortis, a Swiss brand founded in 1912 by Walter Vogt, has a long association with the exploration of outer space. The Fortis Official Cosmonauts Chronograph has been the personal timepiece of astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station project since construction began on the ISS in 2000.
The Fortis B-42 Official Cosmonauts Chronograph Alarm has the distinction of being based on the world's first automatic chronograph alarm (1998) and is the most complicated of Fortis' current offerings. At 42mms, the Fortis sits comfortably on your wrist yet is of adequate size to afford an abundance of dial real estate that makes the displays of the various functions of the B-42 easy to read. The chronograph itself features a large (orange) seconds hand and two subdials to record elapsed minutes and hours (minutes at 12 o'clock and hours at 6). The hands on the subdials devoted to the chronograph are orange to correspond to the chrono seconds hand and draw a distinction between the chronograph function and that of the current time seconds subdial that is positioned on the left side of the dial at 9 o'clock. When you look at the arrangement, it all makes sense and is very intuitive. The alarm time is indicated by the position of an orange arrow that's extended to the minute track by a black hand that is visually lost in the black dial. The status of the alarm (on/off) is indicated by an orange block that appears on the inside of the date display. If the orange block is visible, the alarm is active. To use the alarm function, you first align the alarm arrow with the desired alarm time using the crown, and then activate the alarm by depressing the pusher at the 8 o'clock position on the left side of the case. There's a uni-directional bezel to track elapsed time manually and a sapphire crystal that's coated with anti-reflective material both internally and externally. A tachymeter scale is positioned between the minute track and the exterior bezel.
The B-42 Cosmo Chrono Alarm is a distinctive watch that for me is about as close to 'busy dial' perfection as you can find. It's clear that with this watch and it's wearer there's a lot going on - it's also obvious that everything is well organized and under control.
