Slashdot Mirror
Listening Robot Senses Snipers
Dr. Eggman writes "Popular Science has a brief piece on the RedOwl, a brainy-looking flightless robot that can 'read a nametag from across a football field and identify the make and model of a rifle fired a mile away simply by analyzing the sound of the distant blast.' For a paltry $150,000, the machine utilizes robotic hearing technology originally developed by Boston University's Photonics Center to improve hearing aids to sense a shot fired and pinpoint its source, identify it as a hostile or friendly weapon, and illuminate the target with a laser visible only with night vision. The RedOwl, built on an iRobot packbot platform and controlled via a modified Xbox videogame controller, can figure out the location of a target 3,000 feet away, allowing troops to call in a precision air strike."
Aimbot =(
This kneejerk reaction: "Bah! New stuff is worse than old reliable stuff" isn't appropriate for concept prototypes.
I absolutely agree that only proven technology should be rolled out en-mass, but developments like this robot are extremely valuable. Even if it utterly doesn't work, that's fine - they'll still learn a bunch about automatic auditory sensors, single sensor location calculation, and building robots.
As for the tactical utility of this sort of thing - it absolutely can't be replicated by armored vests. Kevlar does *nothing* against a high powered rifle. Even if every soldier always wore the armor necessary to stop a 7.62 mm rifle round cold, it would be heavy and hot, and they'd just get sniped in the face and upper leg more often. The thing that's really annoying about a sniper isn't that they can injure someone; it's that if you run into a sniper moving through an urban setting you're stopped dead until you can figure out where they are - this can really slow down any kind of urban troop movement. With this robot (conceptually), it reduces the sniper to only one shot - then since you know where they are you can take them out and keep going.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
Whether you're going to find snipers not using night vision goggles in light situations that allow for the use of night vision goggles I don't know, but I think the camera is supposed to provide you with an image in daylight.
The whole point of this device is not having to drop a 500 lb bomb to clear out snipers, and of course to stop people from getting shot when they're trying to find the sniper.
You seem to be confusing "strategy" with "tactics" - this is a tactical device. The bottom line is that if you have a sniper firing at your troops you have two options: Find the sniper and take him or her out, or leave the area (well, three, if you count just going on by in an armored vehicle). You're right that you wouldn't want to take out a sniper with a bomb if the sniper is in a densely populated area, but you can still use the described device to locate the sniper for either evasion or evasion plus attack (going into the apartment building in your scenario or using a friendly sniper to take out the enemy).
Once the sniper is shooting, it's a bit too late to prevent him from doing so by making him your friend.
It's a great thing to be able to know where the threat is, first off. It's a huge improvement over knowing nothing.
Second, the stuff I've read from milblogs and the like leads me to believe that there are rules about what they will hit. This doesn't change that. It's not like the robot has a missile launcher on it's back that it can autonomously respond with. This makes it easier to have a measured response because you know exactly where the threat is.
If you were really concerned about decreasing collateral damage, I think you would consider this a huge benefit. But hey, don't let me stop you from thinking with your political platform!
Liberty uber alles.
...he'll be able to call in precision chair strikes!
Short Answer: Actually, you are incorrect. Our armor is designed to take multiple hits from 7.62-mm ammunition.
Long answer: What the hell are you talking about? This isn't Desert Storm, this is 2007, baby. Check out the Interceptor Body Armor, which has been standard issue for all troops being deployed for a while now.
There are parts of the Interceptor Body Armor that are made of only Kevlar for its flexible properties, such as the groin protector that is hanging off the body armor in the picture. However, as the op says correctly, the thin Kevlar is not designed to take anything more than 9-mm rounds, ideally. The actual parts designed to accept 7.62-mm rounds, "stop plates" as some call them, cover the entire from torso from collarbone to belt buckle, front and back. They are made from some rather advanced ceramics. Nowadays, they even issue armor for your sides and your shoulders, two common places some people get shot and end up dying.
We also wear helmets. In the Army, they're commonly referred to simply as "Kevlars" (Typical example: "Uniform for the EST will be IBA with your kevlar, no LCE." Translation: That means you're going to the computer-simulated firing range with your Interceptor Body Armor and your helmet, but you're not bringing your 'pistol belt' or the canteens and ammo pouches that are typically attached to the pistol belt. The army loves acronyms). Anyway, there are true stories of kevlars taking 7.62 rounds and surviving, but even the helmet made out of kevlar molded to a hard, shaped shell is only designed to accept 9-mm rounds.
And thusly return us to the original short answer, that is: Troops in Iraq wear body armor that takes multiple 7.62-mm rounds. Stay classy, San Di-Slashdot.
A common sniper tactic is to position yourself in a location where hills and other terrain will reflect sound back to the target, confusing the target as to the actual location of your fires. Couldn't sound reflection be brought into play and give the device the wrong location, or a set of wrong locations?
I've read Slashdot for the last 5 years, and now I start posting... Go figure
According to my brother, who just got out of Iraq on his second tour, their ROI have been updated to basically say that if someone is shooting at them they can engage. Previously they had to escalate and get someone who isn't even in the field to okay any engagement.
Except that the sonic boom caused by bullet is not pinpointable. When the bullet flies supersonic, it's creating those sonic booms the whole way (or until it drops below speed of sound). For example one of my sniper trainers was crazy enough to go downrange when another trainer shot a supersonic round with silencer (both were sufficiently good at their trade to have enough trust) and he said that sound of the shot came from completely different direction from where the shooter was. In my opinion and this is also the opinion of my sniper trainers is that every sniper should use silencer. In addition of removing the bang of the rifle, it also reduces recoil and the puff of dirt caused by the supersonic gasses exiting the muzzle.
.22LR rifles with silencers in close range. Usually in constructed areas and aiming at the gaps of the protective gear.
:). I probably wouldn't shoot anything else, but this robot before exiting the area, because $150,000 is probably the most damage I could make with a single bullet :).
Also almost anyone with some skills can construct a silencer. Simplest designs is that you have several metal disks with hole in the middle which matches the caliber of the bullet and those disks are arranged in line, attached to each other with regular interval and covered with a metal sheet.
The wikipedia article is good one on this, although the silencer design presented is more complex what I presented: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suppressor
And the subsonic rounds are not useless for sniper operations. If I remember correctly, when USSR was in Afganistan, the insurgents used
The ability of the robot to find the range and distance of a shot by the bang of the rifle, is nothing new. I believe that US army has that kind of hardware already in some of their hummers. It is also possible to know the direction of a shot by only the flight sound of the bullet, but that requires several 'listening posts' and a central computer to calculate, but this only gets the direction of the shot, not the distance. And in constructed areas usually calculating correct direction is impossible as the sound bounces from the walls. I don't know if this robot can still pinpoint the direction and distance from the bang of the rifle, if there is walls offering echos etc, but atleast human ear is fooled about the direction. There is also equipment that tries to find the bullet inflight with radar etc, but my understanding those are not yet in use because they are not very reliable.
I think that this robot is the number one target for snipers. Shoot it first and then you're home free unless there is a second one
Thermal imaging for finding snipers is not new also, and usually the military uniforms are made so that they present as low thermal image as possible. Snipers can be invisible in thermal image also as to naked eye. I don't think that the Iraq insurgents have enough training for that, but probably they will adapt if this robot is introduced in Iraq. Although I cannot imagine why US troops in Iraq haven't used thermal imaging or bullet radars (as I've learned to call them) before..
PS. My background in this is that I have completed basic sniper training from Finnish defence forces and I have read several respected books on the subject.