US Military Deploys Personal Gunshot Detectors

RedEaredSlider writes "A new warfighting technology will soon be making its way to Afghanistan. US Army forces will be getting gunshot detection systems, which can tell where a shot was fired from. Approximately 13,000 gunshot detection systems will be given to individual footsoldiers later this month, according to the US Army. The system, called Individual Gunshot Detector, has four small acoustic sensors and a small display screen attached to the soldier's body armor that shows the distance and direction of incoming bullets. The sensors are each about the size of a deck of cards and can detect the supersonic sound waves generated by enemy gunfire. It alerts the soldier of the shot's direction in less than one second."

Comments

"supersonic sound waves"

[snookerhog]

if it is really detecting supersonic sound waves, it needs to be re-calibrated methinks...

"Supersonic"

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm interested in these devices that "can detect the supersonic sound waves generated by enemy gunfire."

Supersonic sound waves? As in, sound that travels faster than sound?

Odd.~

If it works, great

[sarbonn]

If this saves any lives, then I'm all for it. I just hope it's not another makeshift technology that some company designed to make money but doesn't actually do anything useful but make rich people richer at the expense of American soldiers.

Re:If it works, great

[demonbug]

If this saves any lives, then I'm all for it.

It's certain this won't save the lives of any Afghans or Iraqis, whether the bullets are coming from a helicopter a mile away or a soldier that just kicked in his front door.

It might, actually. If the American soldiers are better able to determine where they are being shot at from, there is less likelihood of them shooting back at the wrong place. It should, to some extent, reduce "collateral damage".

Of course, I have my doubts about the usefulness in an urban environment (where it would have the most positive effect for reducing collateral damage), where I would think the complicated environment (lots of echoes) would confuse such a device. Maybe they get around that by concentrating on these wondrous sound waves that move faster than the speed of sound.

Re:Truth copies fiction

[GameboyRMH]

I immediately thought of the "red glow of pain" that most modern FPSes have to help you figure out where you're being shot from.

Re:Genius in Marketing.

[GameboyRMH]

4-directional Sonic Input Gunshot Heading Triangulator

4SIGHT

It's a sad day when the military can't come up with a good backronym.

Re:Not Much Help Against the First Shot

[Wyatt Earp]

Thats why most police departments have more than one police station and more than one cop car.

Even during the North LA bank robbery, not every cop in the LAPD was dispatched there.

For your example - guys on the East Side fire off a bunch of rounds, car(s) are dispatched for shots fired calls, they don't see bloody corpses in the streets, they call it back in as responded too and go on to the next call.

West End of town, alarms go off and the police over there still respond.

Re:fireworks

[c6gunner]

I imagine the primary use of this is that, if bullets start flying and you take cover, you will be able to figure out where to return fire (or send backup, etc.) without needing to pop your head out first.

That's more or less right. If the bullets are flying in large quantities it's generally not hard to figure out where they're coming from, but if you've got one or two snipers taking potshots at your platoon, it can be quite difficult to find them. In those cases, the traditional method for locating the shooter involves the section/squad commander yelling "charlie team, take a bound!". This seems much safer.

Re:I doubt it

[Anonymous Coward]

Admittedly I'm no expert, but the examples you give are ones where the meaning of the sound is context-sensitive, and the majority of the "thinking" is dedicated to parsing that context in order to figure out how to assign meaning to the sound.

A weapon report, on the other hand, is self-contained (for lack of a better term). It doesn't have to be compared to the sounds that precede and follow it, at least not for the purposes of telling where it came from and whether it really is from gunfire.

So while I could certainly be wrong, I don't think the problems you describe apply here.

I am curious about how it would handle echo-prone locations like mountains giving it trouble, though.