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Pirates Thwarted by Sonic Weapon
Kristian Hermansen was one of dozens to submit a story about would be pirates attempting to take control of a cruise ship of the coast of Africa, only to be twarted by some sort of
sonic weapon known as an LRAD, or Long Range Acoustic Device.
And if it wasn't for you pesky kids and your LRAD, I would have gotten away with it too!
How many times are we going to have to read stories about music labels putting up false album tracks containing dreck such as Ashlee Simpson in place of Metallica? We get it, the labels don't like pirates....
I think it would be more effective than just giving them a headache.
Pirate:Argggg we've popped our pants. Run.
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
Global Warming is having a direct and measurable impact on the endangered pirate population according to The Flying Spaghetti Monster theory,s ter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_spaghetti_mon
"Global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters are a direct consequence of the decline in numbers of pirates since the 1800s. A graph showing the inverse correlation between the pirates and global temperatures was also provided. This component of the theory highlights the logical fallacy of correlation implying causation. "
Wikipedia reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma_whore
Oddly enough, my wife has one of those built in.
A man without a God is like a fish without a bicycle.
Pirates, man! I mean, a real actual honest-to-$deity story. On Slashdot. About pirates! I mean, PIRATES. The ones with hats. And parrots. I never thought I'd see the day.
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
So a pirate walks into a bar with a steering wheel and an active LRAD device on his crotch. The bartender says: "There's a steering wheel and an LRAD device on your crotch!" The pirate says: "Yar, I know! They're both driving me nuts!"
Oh yes. Pirates are as active as ever. Only nowadays they have machine guns and RPGs instead of blunderbusses and cannons...
Just read IMB's Weekly Piracy Report for an idea of how active and how dangerous modern pirates are.
Timbers Shivered by Shivering Timbres
zork% mv *.asp
283 files eaten by a grue
me? I think the parent post is hillarious. Military and cruise ships using 150 decibel brown noise weapons? Now that's an idea!
Reminds me of an old joke... Now this isn't the exact version, but its as close as I can remember...
Whenver the captain of an old spanish galleon was heading into battle, he always asked his assistant to fetch him his red pants so that if he were to be injured and bleed, his crewmen would not see the blood and lose hope. One day, they were heading into battle against a massively powerful enemy. The captain saw the assistant already going to fetch the red pants and shouted, "Stop! This time, get me my brown pants!"
Has anyone had a chance to play with one of these? (Or been played with by someone with one of these like at the 2004 republican convention in NYC? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LRAD)
Since it is just sound, and apparently high-frequency sound (thus relatively low-energy vs low-frequency sound) I wonder if something as simple as noise-cancellation headphones would provide significant protection against LRAD usage.
Will we see pirates wearing Bose noise-cancellation headphones and listening to pirated music while they pirate real ships now?
The article seems to omit the fact that this is possible and effective against the pirates, because they play COUNTRY 'MUSIC' through this thing.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
A bit OT but fun to know...
Pirates do exist, and account for nearly $16b in losses annually. If you're interested in a career like Han Solo, piracy is an option.
Most pirates today work between Eritria and Mumbai. Seychelles is very casual about accepting boats without valid port histories. The pirate ships are often large yachts with fast ciggy boats for docking. Glocks and Kalishies are the norm. The dress is much like the old pirate look -- bandanas, beards, loose shirts, etc.
Pirate robbers make the news often, yet most pirates are smugglers (food, drugs, medicine and health equipment). Countries with US/UN embargoes pay well -- 400% over the white market rate.
Cuba was easy money until 9/11, now we have our Coast Guard pretending to fight terrorism but actually destroying the free market in smuggling.
Malaysia has a growing piracy need as the government gets more religious. Somalia and Sri Lanka both ignore the pirates like Seychelles.
Take a trip to Dubai or Seychelles. Hook up with the right crowd and you can make 6 figures easily.
Arrrrr!
...to stop using their terminology. It's not *piracy*, it's infring... hold on, wait a sec... this is about real pirates, you say?!? Can't ... I don't... how to proceed...
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Something you left out from the wiki content:
"At maximum volume, it can emit a warning tone that is 151 decibels (1000 W/m) at 1 metre, a level that is very capable of permanently damaging hearing."
I'm not sure I'd call that "an ideal use of this technology in private sector" as you put it... ethical concerns don't just go away if you're "private sector".
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Hard to believe right? I am from the coastal city of Bosaso on the horn of Africa, and some of my relatives took pride in their high-seas piracy. I have always heard of illegal Japanese and Norwegian ships illegaly fishing in our shores, while Somalis, with not central government and coast guard, sat around in anger and frustration.
9 733&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__africa/
This piracy started as a way to defend our coast-lines from illegal international fishing. Somalia hasn't had a government since 1990, and our fish resources became the loot of international fishing conglomerates. Others have used our coast to dump their waste, even nuclear waste.
After the fall of the Somali government, our coast guard's ships and vessels were looted by tribes. Some of our ships and boats were sold to illegal fishing companies, which didn't go far but stayed to fish in our waters! While other boats stayed in the hands of tribal leaders and warlords who used them for piracy and people smuggling to the middle east, although more often as a vehicle for products and trade with Yemen, our neighbor to the North.
It's funny how companies registered in Democratic developed nations, and pay their taxes there, are the ones looting our natural resources and using our sea and land to dump their waste.
http://gurukul.ucc.american.edu/ted/somalia.htm
http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=24
http://somalinet.com/news/world/Somalia/1063
I wish the international community would deploy high-tech sonic weapons to defend us against real theives, not just pirates, blinded and deafended by greed.
- Mahammad Darwish
Can you elaborate?
;-). ) Air at high volume is not linear. For example you can compress air to several atmospheres. The reverse is not true. You can not draw several atmospheres of vacuum. You are limited by the hard limit of pure vacuum. Air compressing and expanding is non-linear.
Yes.
Sending a 1Khz tone a long distance would require a large reflector to produce a relatively tight beam. Sending a 30 KHZ tone requires a much smaller reflector to deliver the acoustic power the same distance. The small dish sends high power signals. For example if we sent 30Khz and 31Khz, they would both travel in a well defined beam as a ~30Khz signal. Unfortunately we can't hear 30 Khz ultrasonic signals (except for a few audiophiles
Now enter a couple very high intensity sound waves of two frequencies. Now you have non-linear mixing. In non linear mixing (just like in a radio reciever) you get out the 2 original frequencies + the sum and the difference. Therefore 30Khz + 31 Khz is 30Khz, 31Khz, 61Khz and 1Khz. Now you have delivered a very loud and painful 1Khz sound using the tight beam delivery of 30Khz with a small dish.
The truth shall set you free!