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Don't Worry, That Blimp Isn't Watching You Much
According to the Baltimore Sun, and despite claims by its maker Raytheon that the system is "performing well right now," the expensive tethered-blimp observatory called JLENS (for "Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System") seems to be mostly a boondoggle. The report focuses on the JLENS installation that was launched in Maryland last year. The Sun makes much of the flight taken by disaffected postal worker Douglas Hughes last April to the White House lawn, directly in the JLENS observation area -- the success of which (to be charitable) casts doubt on the effectiveness of the flying observatory system. Beyond its evidently low utility in doing its job, JLENS seems to be a brittle system, amplying its potential costs as well as its military vulnerability with grand, expensive failures as well as everyday difficulties: in 2010, "a civilian balloon broke loose from its mooring, destroying a grounded JLENS blimp that had cost about $182 million." The article lays out some political shenanigans, too: politicians in a wide range of states have supported the project, which has a nationwide footprint of contractors and possible deployment locations. From the article:
Within the Pentagon, Marine Corps Gen. James E. "Hoss" Cartwright, then vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came to JLENS' defense, arguing that it held promise for enhancing the nation's air defenses. At Cartwright's urging, money was found in 2011 for a trial run of the technology in the skies above Washington.
Cartwright retired the same year — and joined Raytheon's board of directors five months later. By the end of 2014, Raytheon had paid him more than $828,000 in cash and stock for serving as a director, Securities and Exchange Commission records show.
"pork" is the spy in the sky.
The US government is massively corrupt.
From ignoring and perverting the constitution to outright blowing the revenue from taxpayers on boondoggles, we've definitely gotten the government the special interest groups and rich people have purchased.
Yay. (waves flag feebly)
Hey - I wonder which brown people are we going to pretend are a "real threat" to us today? "Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System" Cuz, you know, there must be camels carrying cruise missiles aimed at the USA RIGHT NOW!
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Hopefully, we're at least feeding other industries with research conducted during the development of this project. Governments are the only investors willing and able to accept the risk associated with this level of spending.
The War Nerd: More proof the US defense industry has nothing to do with defending America
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
pigs, man. pigs go Oink Oink, not MOOO.
I'm no aeronautical engineer, but when anyone mentions balloons, blimps, dirigibles, Zeppelins, etc. I think they just might be a little bit susceptible to the weather as they rely on gas bags and lighter-than-air construction to stay aloft. I'm sure Zeppelins can be a lot of fun to fly around in on a nice sunny Sunday afternoon while drinking champagne, eating oysters off the half shell and smoking a cigar, but they are hardly useful for military applications or anything requiring 24/7, 365 days per year coverage. This also goes for Nicolai Tesla's idea of transmitting electricity via balloon, or more recently google's internet balloons or Putin's monster troop Zeppelins. These ideas seem to come up from time to time, so that I'm beginning to wonder if there's an out-of-work Zeppelin Engineer who goes from town to town pitching his ideas. Kaiser Wilhelm II once said of Count Zeppelin, "of all the south Germans, he is by a wide margin the dumbest."
They are blimp-shaped balloons, not blimps. Blimps have engines and propellers. These don't.
Its the old revolving door, I worked in the defense industry back in the late 1950's and we had a retired general or some such muckety muck running our corporation. Lots of pork even then. Never seems to change for the better, only the worst. Revolving doors for the higher ups, just look at our former Attorney General who just left for his old job defending banks. They even kept his chair warm and better yet, no banksters of note went to jail.
"a civilian balloon broke loose from its mooring, destroying a grounded JLENS blimp that had cost about $182 million."
I'm sure that'll buff right out.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
It has been my understanding that the feds have been using a tethered blimp at the extreme edge of southern Florida to detect drug runners for more than a decade. Perhaps it is now out of service but a few years back they were observing more drug boats racing for the edge of the everglades than they could hope to confront and a good number of planes dropping packages from the air as well. There was a lot of flack as the defenses were way down during popular events such as Super Bowl and Christmas mornings.
Sit and watch while idiots centralize enough of it?
I don't know which I hate more, when people do cartwheels naming a thing to make the acronym a specific word (e.g. PATRIOT Act), or when someone takes something like "Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System" and somehow decides that its acronym is "JLENS". JLACMDENSS not catchy enough? Then just call it "that fucking blimp we built".
You were critically hit for no damage. The bruise will look nice, and maybe the scars will make good party talk.
According to the Sun article, this whole project has cost $2.7 billion (with a Carl Sagan B) over 17 years. Yes, lobbyists are powerful enough, congressmen are stupid enough, and voters are apathetic enough to allow this to happen.
You were critically hit for no damage. The bruise will look nice, and maybe the scars will make good party talk.
There is a thing over the US that is for cruise missile defense?
Exactly how much of a threat are those in Washington? Considering exactly none of them have ever been fired in anger at the United States, it makes me wonder.
And what is this thing going to do about a cruise missile if it does see one? Maybe it is supposed to be connected to some kind of air defense, but the only way one of those is going to be shot down is if it is detected over the horizon.
Of course, Raytheon wasting tax dollars on pork? Say it ain't so. Why are the congresscritters that authorize this stuff never taken to task?
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
The linked Wikipedia say JLENS Unit cost is $175 million then we see the above quote "...destroying a grounded JLENS blimp that had cost about $182 million..." That looks like fact cherry picking to me.
Even $200 million is very cheap for a movable 3km high radar tower, and if it doesn't see everything the same radar gear on the ground is going to see even less.
For a big hardware DoD project, $2.7B over 17 years is not that much. Most of that money goes to people's salaries and materials, manufactured mostly in the US.
You can ask whether the money was wisely spent, but developing advanced tech is never risk-free. Sometimes, shit doesn't work. That doesn't mean the project was economically worthless.
Are we supposed to be surprised by a political operator making his last act in his position assuring himself a big payout when he retires? This is nothing new.
In November Boener will announce he's now executive this or that at some lobbying firm and three money will roll in. Just another day here at USA corp.
The worlds most expensive social program. If we want to keep our economy going how about we build some roads instead?
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That's basically what I was trying to tell the AC I responded to. But nihil novi sub sole is neither a full explanation, nor an excuse for it to continue.
You were critically hit for no damage. The bruise will look nice, and maybe the scars will make good party talk.
It's funny how people get apathetic about the giant floppy blimp in the sky after looking at it long enough.
The blimps are deployed to protect Washington, D.C. against the Nuclear cruise missile armed Russian submarines that Putin has redeployed near the US coast - presumably as a stop-gap measure till they can build and test a new generation of ballistic missile submarines (the first of which was launched recently.) The system is designed to detect cruise missiles coming in at supersonic or high subsonic velocities; weapons with very unique and well-known sensor signatures. A system that picks up one asshole riding an autogyro will also pick up bird flocks, ultra-lights and other things, and generate so many false positives that it will be useless. Filtering out extraneous data is a crucial component of any early warning system. Leave it to a journalist to criticize a crash-program implemented to counter a real and present danger for doing exactly what it's supposed to do.