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Drone-Mounted Laser Weapons Are On the Way
Daniel_Stuckey writes "DARPA is funding research into drone-mounted laser weapons. The project, called Endurance, is referred to in DARPA's 2014 budget request as being tasked with the development of 'technology for pod-mounted lasers to protect a variety of airborne platforms from emerging and legacy EO/IR guided surface-to-air missiles.' The budget explains that it will be the first application of DARPA's much-discussed Excalibur laser defense system, which developed lasers powerful enough to use as weapons. With the new program, DARPA is focused on miniaturizing the technology, as well as 'developing high-precision target tracking, identification, and lightweight agile beam control to support target engagement. The program will also focus on the phenomenology of laser-target interactions and associated threat vulnerabilities." In other words, DARPA hopes that drone-mounted lasers will soon be able to shoot missiles out of the sky."
(whilst wearing my tin hat - na na - cannot get me)
So it's both immoral AND unethical...
Warning: Do not look at drone with remaining eye...
If a hostile missile is covered with mirrors will that not just reflect the beam, and a adjustable mirror can take the drone out.
They should designate it the Semiautonomous, High-Altitude Recon/Kill drone, so that we can finally have SHARKs with frickin' laser beams.
I never thought I'd feel nostalgic about the "good old days" when only sharks had mounted laser weapons.
Power source? I am immediately struck by the design obstacle of stashing enough power capacity onto a 140 hp propeller UAV. Even if designers manage to get enough power stored on board, it will most likely result in the drone being limited to a single blast (while seriously degrading operational range).
This sounds like a pretty cool video game. I've always an RTS where you can drop drones with lasers into the battlefield... and they're probably stealthed, too! Thankfully, no military in the world would ever make something this crazy, though.
Why are you telling me that I need to reread the original post?
Teaching laser drones Phenomenology?
"Let there be light!"
--- Mercutio was right.
Seeing as they specifically mention Electro-Optical and Infra-Red guided missiles, It seems that the objective is not to 'blow up' a missile as the linked article suggests, but rather to use a laser to blind the missile's tracking systems, causing it to lose tracking and veer off target or "generate a miss" as they say.
Getting a laser to destroy a missile requires about 100 kW of energy and a few tons of hardware to focus it.
Getting a laser to blind optical sensors requires a $10 Radio Shack gift card.
Making a pun about this one would be like shooting sharks in a barrel.
...US Congressman, Senator, House of Representative, White House personnel...then you'll hear the outcry against it.
Nothing good will come of this, nothing.
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
The problem is the arms race.
Drone figures from WP show that as of Q1 2009, of the 223 USAF UAVs in operational service, only 4 were shot down. Whereas 11 were lost due to accidents (mainly flying into things), and 55 were lost due to equipment failure, operator error, or weather.
Importantly, the current failsafe for OOC UAVs is to shoot them down with AIM-9 missiles, which is what happened to a reaper on 13 September 2009. Developing an autonomous laser defence would preclude this failsafe.
In brief, the US government should be spending it's money on other problems. Given a vote, I doubt that the US populace would sign up for this particular budgetary spend.
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This feels like the movie Real Genius
Seems obvious to me the eventual use of the technology will be to remotely fry people. Much less colloteral damage compared to firing a missle. Just fire the lazer at their head for a few (mili?)seconds and they're dead.
Lasers on the heads of drones but not on the heads of sharks yet? Dr. Evil must be disappointed.
Quad copters seem to be all the rage right now. Perhaps large quad copters could carry all kinds of weaponry both fer defense and aggression that could be kept airborne during moments of great danger. Lasers are only one tool. Small missiles that can take down enemy planes or missiles would have quite an edge if launched from a decent altitude. Ground troops could also be dealt with by hovering platforms hovering directly above. Weapons such as tanks might be rather useless against such a system.
The first model with a laser so-equipped really needs to be called the "Shark".
-Styopa
Tin-foil turbans.
better update their LinkedIn profile
I can build my drone control module and my drone swarms and take the battle to the dirty Methanoids!
The Solar System, and the entire Galaxy, will be Humanity's!
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Do they mate with the friggin' Shark Queen?
Would that make them Friggin' Frankin' Sharks?
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Only thing missing now is the shark grin nose paint...
Apart from any ethical consideration, at least it creates jobs for many scientists and engineers and as such stimulates the economy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSactZxGGrw And kill the working class in a world of diminished resources.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rthHSISkM7A
Lockheed and the rest of the defense industry must be crapping their pants: if lasers take off then missiles AND guns will be obsolete and the future of air combat is going to be 100% about stealth because you can't dodge something traveling the speed of light.
An autonomous platform asked to perform beyond existing technology using a weapon that is inefficient, ineffective, and hyper expensive.
Useless.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
lol I read that as lasers with drones mounted on them. As in my lasers has 3 drones mounted on it.
What do you think a phase target tracking system is FOR?
All the technical superiority in the world will never defeat a committed opposition
which is ready to die to defeat its enemy.
If you doubt this is true, you need to read more history.
What this continued development of weapons systems is really about is enriching
the 1% who are the primary conspirators in the military-industrial complex. A
serious war will involve ICBMs fired from submarines, which use MIRVs which
will not all be defeated before they reach their targets. Of course anyone in the military
who is not an idiot ( a small minority fits this description, to be sure ) knows this is true.
,
Are these laser-equipped drones programmed to shoot at The Flood or shoot at you?
You know, I have one simple request. And that is to have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads
Jessica focused her mind on lasguns, wondering. The white-hot beams of disruptive light could cut through any known substance, provided that substance was not shielded. The fact that feedback from a shield would explode both lasgun and shield did not bother the Harkonnens. Why? A lasgun-shield explosion was a dangerous variable, could be more powerful than atomics, could kill only the gunner and his shielded target.
"The Greens lynched a hacker in Chicago. Last month, but I think the body's still hanging from the old Water Tower."
Pop popcorn?
A girl has gotta have her standards.
No, not the laser weapon program (which will just have the usual amount of fraud) but the DEFENSIVE RESPONSE. Cloud machines will get some serious research as well as water misting, reflective dust or "nano particle mirrors" from filling the air to special paint.
These lasers can't fire long sustained blasts, you just have to dissipate the heat for that short period of time. Visible light lasers are going to be significantly impacted by the AIR and distance to target as well as the humidity.
Not to mention the Geneva treaties which banned blinding weapons along with chemical warfare. Your legit laser weapon shot over a long distance is going to diffuse so that tank at 10 miles away is now the side of city block with blind children. Still preferable to generations of horrific birth defects the nuclear waste (depleted uranium) causes today... Amazing that nuclear waste is allowed as a weapon just because it's not literally a chemical weapon.... If I throw this acid at you really hard... it's a kinetic weapon not a chemical one! ;-p
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
DARPA is focused on miniaturizing the technology, as well as 'developing high-precision target tracking...
If they miniaturize and precisionize them enough to do Lasik, could they call it a "surgical strike"?
Ha! I got a million of 'em!
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
mounted on the head of the new SHARK Drone series?
I'm hoping that "Endurance" is only the *public* project name. This project is just too perfect not to have the internal, official project designation "Sharknado."
Instead of trying to punch holes in things, why not do what even cheap handheld lasers are eminently good at--- blinding people? Rake a powerful laser across the windshield of a speeding SUV and laugh while the vehicle runs off the road, flips, and burns simply because the person operating it is screaming in rage and agony because they've been blinded.
Real Genius work there. All I need now is some popcorn.
Instead of tens of wedding guests being blown to smithereens by the shrapnel from a missile, they'll be burnt to death by a laser. I'm not sure which is more humane. At least with a missile, there is a short period of time after it's launched to run for cover...
Stick Men
The next generation of drones from the USA and Israel are designed to inflict permanent blindness on large numbers of targets during a short attack period. Face recognition algorithms are designed to identify the location of the eyes, and modern dedicated computer designs can do this task in well below a millisecond, allowing dozens of Humans to be acquired for blinding every second.
Modern , miiror-based, laser targeting and ultra-high power pulse equipment, allows thousands of precise laser-pulse strikes every second. Obviously, this Crime against Humanity (and a crime against all war conduct treaties, treaties that Obama and the mainstream press have STATED do NOT apply to the US military) only works against civilian defenders of nations currently under attack/invasion by forces of Obama or Israel. Proper soldiers will have helmets including optical shields rendering the laser pulses mostly harmless.
This is why Obama LOVES this weapon system, and has ordered for it to be fast-tracked. It cannot be turned against the genocidal forces of the USA or Israel, since American taxpayers provide BOTH (or at least the uniformed Israeli thugs) with state-of-the-art protective gear.
Takes Obama's destruction of Libya. As Obama's terrorist forces swept from region to region, the male adults of a town/village would set up road-blocks to discourages the terrorists from entering their neighbourhood. Obama ordered the NATO strikes to concentrate on murdering all these civilian defenders of their own home towns/villages- exterminating tens of thousands of them until ordinary people ceased attempting to hold back the terrorists. In the near future, Obama can send fleets of drones over the towns and cities that refuse to lick his jackboots, and blind every Human who dares to venture outdoors and show 'defiance' by attempting to live their lives normally.
America is spending an ever increasing budget on developing new weapons of mass terror and mass murder. America is growing its war machine at an every accelerating rate. American zionists are flooding all mainstream media outlets with pro-war propaganda, and America is now a war-time society. Where in heaven's name do you people think this is going to end up?
is the best approach because it could capture the laser, bend it around, and shoot it back at out at the drone. remember space balls? how they used that row of pipes to fire back at the guys with laser guns?
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
When the laser shoots through the window the vibrations it picks up can be used to record all sounds inside the building. It has been going on for years now. So picture this on a massive scale with airborne drones peeping in at all hours of the day.