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Army Eyes Anti-Sniper Robot
Hiawatha writes "iRobot has teamed up with Boston University to create a robot that can spot enemy snipers on a battlefield. Before the smoke of the shot clears away, the REDOWL robot should have the shooter in its sights." iRobot is the same company that brought you the popular Roomba robotic vacuum.
Testers struck pieces of metal to simulate gunshots. REDOWL quickly aimed its infrared camera and laser rangefinder at the source of the noise, just as it did in tests at a Medfield gun range.
If this is the case, this RedOwl can easily be fooled where there are multiple gunshots, especially in a battle field.
While system could fire back at an enemy, it would be dangerous to have a weapon-toting robot that could open fire on its own. You need to have a man in the loop.
By the time a man reacts, the sniper could have fled, or worse, fired another shot at him.
... as long as there are couches for the anti-sniper robots to go hide under when they run out of juice and get lost looking for their docking units.
Besides, he said, it would be dangerous to have a weapon-toting robot that could open fire on its own.
''You need to have a man in the loop," he said.
The article says that the robot would not return fire, it would just pinpoint where the shooting is coming from. So, why does it need to be a robot exactly? Why wouldn't it just be a comptuer with some cameras and microphones?
One idea is that our soldiers could have a chip in their dogtags that the robot could identify so as to not shoot at them. Then you would have the problem of the enemy stealing people's dog tags, but maybe you could deactivate that code once you knew the enemy had the tag.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
After shooting the sniper, the robot proceeds to vacuum the battlefield.
I work for a company called Trex Enterprises, and we built one of these a long time ago. Go check it out on our website... http://www.trexenterprises.com/laserrad.html
Getting pwn3d by a .50cal through a wall may not qualify as wallhacking, but still... aimbots vs. campers.
War may never have been fun, but remember the good old days, when it was supposed to be? :)
"I think I saw that movie, the Robots won".
**insert favorite profound quotation here**
Back in the old days, before Rod Brooks started iRobot, I worked part-time at a small MIT AI Lab spinoff making robots for kids called Turtles. The Turtle was an outcome of Logo, and, which itself was an outgrowth of Lisp, and so somehow the company's name got on a list of AI and Robotics vendors. (Sidenote: Lego Mindstorms also came from this same group of people at MIT and industry, though not this particular startup.)
Anyway, we got a letter from a defense contractor asking for "applications of our AI and robotics products to battlefield logistics" and gave a half-dozen or so areas for us to evaluate our products.
As you can imagine, puzzlement gave way to amusement, which quickly gave way to mayhem and by 3:05AM we had started writing our response, starting off with "The Turtle enjoys very low observability, due to a minimal radar cross-section and an almost non-existent infra-red signature."
The letter made the rounds on the photocopy/bulletin-board circuit (there was no electronic copy available outside), and somehow the response got published in an ACM journal. Through the magic of modern imaging, it is available for you to read today in PDF.
How is this roomba going to fit the dead sniper in the tiny little vacuum cleaner bag?
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
I admit that I know nothing about this technology, at all, but in my imagination, I would like to think that a technology such as the one used for hunting via the internet would be a little better. At least a real human would have the ability to decide when and where to shoot rather than relying on code to decide whether or not the target is friend of foe.
;-).
Just a thought, though I admit that a robot has a lot more of the geek quality many of us would like to see
My lame blog.
If it's from the makers of roomba, all the sniper has to do is stand in a corner and that bot will never be able to get him.
I can just imagine the way that the robot alerts the soldiers with it:
We Are The Targeting Robots
We Are Here To Protect You
The Sniper Is Detected
The Sniper Has Gone Down The Stairs
***
We Are The Targeting Robots
Grandpa Is Detected
Grandpa Is Detected At The Bottom Of The Stairs
I Am Here To Protect You
I Will Direct Fire On Top Of Grandpa
"'If one must live then one must die.' - oh, the truth must be funnier than this..." -- MammÃt
I hate it when people point out the blindingly obvious limitations of something as if they are some devastating flaws that render it useless.
The sniper might run away? Wow such insight!
In reality encouraging snipers to run away is still going to be a win on the battlefield. Presumably most snipers hole up in a reasonably secure, hidden vantage point and remain there. If a technology makes that unfeasible then you've gone a long way to decreasing their effectiveness as their initial tactical advantage is neutralised on their first shot. A sniper who's legging it isn't shooting at you and if you have a camera automatically pointing in his direction then tracking him is a possibility.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
[...] ground troops will find it hard to spot even at very close range.
[...] our research department is currently engaged in the testing of a 100-mile C3 for the Turtle. The thrust of this research is towards the development of an Extended-Range Turtle II. While this does result in a shorter tooth-to-tail ratio, we feel it could significantly enhance the battlefield capabilities of Turtle installations.
3. Installation Cost
The Terrapin Turtle is designed for installation at no cost by children and elementary school teachers. We feel that military installation cost should be under $10,000/unit.
4. Annual Cost of expendable supplies and spares per unit.
Ball-point Pen refills $0.59(one spare included)
In the rugged terrain of the battlefield, under rigorous load conditions, it may be necessary to occasinally replace the Turtle Tires. Due to fluctuations in the world rubber market, quotation of exact prices is not possible.
I love it.
I few years ago I think one of the Discovery channels had something on an optical bullet tracker, I'm not sure if it was from Trex or not. Basically, it took advantage of the fact that bullets move much faster than anything in their vicinity, so the only major differences between successive images from a high-speed digital camera would most likely be the bullets. They had a cool demo system where the camera was pointing at a shooting gun in the distance, and it was highlighting the trajectories of the bullets it detected on a computer screen, with all of the lines converging on the gun. Couple this optical system with acoustic triangulation, and you have the best of both systems: zero in the camera quickly on the general source of the shots using sound, then pin-point the exact source of the bullets optically. Eventually this system could be made compact enough to fit on top of a rifle like a digital scope.
. . . eBay has expressed interest in the technology for as yet unspecified applications.
I used to be in the US Marines and was trained as a Designated Marksman, which is an urban sniper, and worked with many of the Scout-Snipers which are the "classic" snipers.
.50 caliber rifle (A.K.A. Special Application Sniper Rifle (SASR)). This means 5 seconds until the sound is heard and means the sniper can get a decent head start running away, if they want, which they probably don't or they can just stand up, wave, and be happy they are outside the range of any weapon their target is carrying. This is assuming they don't fire from the crest of a hill and slowly back down off of it removing themselves from any danger of direct-fired weapons. Yes, indirect fire is still a problem, but it has always been a problem. If you know where the sniper is, you can always call for mortar or artillery fire. However, this is hardly cost effective, and even calling in a strike on their position does not guarantee a kill - especially if they choose their location wisely.
My first comment is that a good sniper can hit someone at ~1500 meters with a
Second, snipers are some of the sneakiest people I have ever met. If you tell them there is a robot that will respond to the noise they make, they will just set up a booby trap a hundred meters away and have their spotter trigger it at the same time they shoot. (Snipers always work in teams.) There is no way the robot is going to hear a bullet fired when it is being over-loaded by the sound of 2 pounds of C4 being detonated. If the snipers find out that it can still hear them, they will daisy chain a couple of claymore mines together with some det cord just to make things more confusing.
Finally, on a sort-of-related-but-side note, I have seen bullets fly through the air and it is pretty cool. When standing behind a shooter, just focus on the air about half-way to their target. After a few shots, your eye will start focusing on the bullet.
Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.