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How The Navy Tried To Turn Sharks into Torpedos (undark.org)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the sharkpedo dept.

Long-time Slashdot reader v3rgEz writes: Documents recently declassified show one of the odder experimental weapons developed after World War II: Weaponized sharks. Guided by sharp electric shocks, the sharks were trained to deliver explosive payloads -- essentially turning them into living, breathing, remote-controlled torpedoes that could be put to use in the Pacific Theater.
Following years of research on "shark repellent," the Navy spent 13 years building a special head gear for sharks which sensed the shark's direction and tried to deliver shocks if the sharks strayed off-course. The journalist who tracked down details of "Project Headgear" published the recently-declassified information on MIT's journalism site Undark, noting that "The shark wasn't so much a 'torpedo' as a suicide bomber... "

60 comments

  1. Suicide bomber? by jawtheshark · · Score: 1

    It's not suicide, if they didn't have a choice.

    --
    Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
    1. Re: Suicide bomber? by ememisya · · Score: 1

      I was surprised by the clear lack of laser beams myself.

    2. Re: Suicide bomber? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      I was surprised by the clear lack of laser beams myself.

      This project started in 1958. Lasers were invented in1960. Early lasers were way too bulky to fit on a shark's head harness, and could not be immersed in saltwater.

    3. Re: Suicide bomber? by michelcolman · · Score: 1

      Actually they started out with this shark bomber project, but it was considered too wasteful to train sharks and then blow them up on their first and only mission. So they started thinking "what if we could attach some other device to the sharks, maybe something like a really strong beam of light that can burn through hulls" and that lead to the invention of the laser shortly afterwards. So next time you see Jaws on DVD or blueray, remember you have sharks to thank for that.

    4. Re: Suicide bomber? by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      Actually they started out with this shark bomber project, but it was considered too wasteful to train sharks and then blow them up on their first and only mission. So they started thinking "what if we could attach some other device to the sharks, maybe something like a really strong beam of light that can burn through hulls" and that lead to the invention of the laser shortly afterwards. So next time you see Jaws on DVD or blueray, remember you have sharks to thank for that.

      followed by the invention of the sharknado, and the rest is history

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
  2. Has to be said... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Sharkpedo?

    1. Re:Has to be said... by binarylarry · · Score: 1

      I said FRIKKIN LAZERS, not TORPEDOS!

      What am I, a frenchman?

      --
      Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
  3. Inhuman by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Using animals as suicide bombers. Inexcusable.

    1. Re:Inhuman by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Much better to ride them into battle. The outcome is so much different.

    2. Re: Inhuman by Nidi62 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The Soviets trained strapped antitank mines to dogs and trained them to run under German tanks. The mines had a trigger mechanism that would trip when they went under the tank. The story goes though that captured German tanks were in short supply so they had to use Soviet tanks when training the dogs. This led to unfortunate results in battle because the dogs would go towards Soviet tanks (which used and smelled of diesel) than German tanks (gas).

      --
      The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
    3. Re:Inhuman by Calydor · · Score: 2

      At least in the case of cavalry the human involved faces equal risk - this is akin to drone assassinations carried out by some guy sitting in complete safety in a room with air condition while sipping a drink.

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      -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
    4. Re:Inhuman by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No it isn't there just animals. Who gives a fuck if some die?

    5. Re: Inhuman by msdhonimovie · · Score: 1

      yeah its working perfectly.. without issue

    6. Re:Inhuman by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your english teacher might give a fuck.

    7. Re:Inhuman by michelcolman · · Score: 1

      this is akin to drone assassinations carried out by some guy sitting in complete safety in a room with air condition while sipping a drink.

      Yeah, those hackers sitting in their mother's basement killing drones from a distance... inexcusable.

    8. Re:Inhuman by whodunit · · Score: 1

      The Russians who used anti-tank dogs in WWII felt the same way. They would have preferred to use Chechens, but they cannot be trained.

    9. Re:Inhuman by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So are you, but I value you less than cats and dogs and sharks, because you have the intelligence not to be a cunt yet you choose to be one.

    10. Re:Inhuman by Dread_ed · · Score: 1

      Using apex predators to take out mortal enemies? Its a win-win.

      Fuck sharks, crocodiles, alligators, tigers, lions, bears, hippos, etc. Anything with the ability to kill humans that hasn't learned better by now is insufficiently extinct.

      --
      When the only tool you have is a claw hammer every problem starts to look like the back of someone's skull.
    11. Re:Inhuman by Gamer_2k4 · · Score: 1

      Using animals as suicide bombers. Inexcusable.

      So it's okay to catch a fish (which kills one animal), but it's not okay to use a shark as a bomb (which kills one animal and is useful)?

    12. Re:Inhuman by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      During a major war, why shouldn't we use animals as missile guidance systems? Are their lives more sacrosanct than the people who were are going to blow up?

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
  4. Why didn't they use lawyers instead? by sehlat · · Score: 2

    Might have been simpler and result in less guilt over harming innocent sharks.

  5. Lasers? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Cause you know... sharks with lasers.

    1. Re:Lasers? by hey! · · Score: 1

      The problem with satire ... even travesty ... is that eventually you realize that you can't compete with real life.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  6. Sharks don't breathe by BarbaraHudson · · Score: -1, Troll

    From the summary:

    turning them into living, breathing, remote-controlled torpedoes

    Sharks don't have lungs. They don't breathe. Of course, the statement doesn't appear in the article, just being a factoid springing wholly formed from the imagination of the submitter.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    1. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      So, miss smartypants, what do they do to process oxygen? Which word should the submitter have used?

      Stop being condescending and try to educate the lower life forms instead of merely insulting them.

    2. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Zontar+The+Mindless · · Score: 1

      Um? They don't have those gills for decoration.

      --
      Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
    3. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Knuckles · · Score: 1

      So what's the verb for extracting oxygen from water with gills?

      --
      "When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
    4. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Dahamma · · Score: 1

      I just asked my marine-biolog-trained wife and yes, scientists call oxygen exchange via gills "breathing". You could also somewhat more generically say "respiring" but the first definition of respiring in most dictionaries is "breathing". So in both common and everyday scientific use they are interchanegable.

      Summary: please go take your pointless pedantism somewhere else, we're all full up here.

    5. Re:Sharks don't breathe by tomhath · · Score: 1

      So what's the verb for extracting oxygen from water with gills?

      "Ventilation" or "Breathing". Both are correct. "Respiration" also works, although that actually describes a more complicated process.

    6. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Knuckles · · Score: 1

      Thanks

      --
      "When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
    7. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What, you don't find it entertaining when someone tries to appear smart and smug by making a correction that turns out to be dead wrong, thus showing how arrogance and stupidity go hand-in-hand?

    8. Re:Sharks don't breathe by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 2

      "Ventilation" or "Breathing". Both are correct. "Respiration" also works, although that actually describes a more complicated process.

      I remember having this discussion late on a Saturday night in a beer session back in my university days.

      The biology major told us that gills work by "exchanging gasses."

      What a terrible waste of beer, as we all spit it out or laughed it out our noses.

      At any rate, we got a lot of mileage out of that one, as we would say stuff like, "Has someone been exchanging gasses in here?" or "I need to go exchange some gasses."

      --
      Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
    9. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think the first 10 times Barbara did that on /. it was a bit annoying but amusing. Now it's just tiring.

    10. Re: Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      Why was it funny to say exchange gas?

    11. Re: Sharks don't breathe by Calydor · · Score: 2

      Immature misunderstanding of how surprise buttsex works.

      --
      -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
    12. Re:Sharks don't breathe by Deadstick · · Score: 2

      I'll see your pointless pedantism and raise you pedantry.

    13. Re: Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I shit on the lower lifeforms.

    14. Re: Sharks don't breathe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nerds are always pedantic. They think it makes them look smart. That's why we don't talk to them, and just pull up their pants and shove them heads down into wastebaskets.

  7. Sharkpedo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wasn't there a movie about this?

    1. Re:Sharkpedo! by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 2

      I think "Sharknado" might be more compelling if those sharks also had explosives strapped to their heads...

      --
      #DeleteChrome
  8. Bad idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You know all those landmines left after Vietnam that still kill people to this day? Imagine sharks with live ordinance wandering the ocean for decades.

    1. Re:Bad idea by Deadstick · · Score: 2

      Imagine sharks with live ordinance

      Ummm, "shark with ordinance" would seem to describe a lawyer.

  9. And this is odd because why? by davidwr · · Score: 2

    Within the realm of military research, this doesn't seem far-fetched.

    --
    Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
  10. That was never a secret by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I can't imagine what part of this was classified, as it was public knowledge at the time and was written about in newspapers and magazines all over the world.

  11. Stupid statement by fnj · · Score: 1

    There was no "Pacific Theater" AFTER World War II. Sheesh. Certainly not 1958-1971.

    1. Re:Stupid statement by whodunit · · Score: 1

      Yeah, we kept nukes on Iwo Jima for most of the Cold War for shits and giggles, right?

  12. Jeff Fucking Dunham by Chas · · Score: 1

    So now we're going to see him pop out a rubber "cartilage" shark skeleton that screams "Allahu *BLUB*BLUB!*

    --


    Chas - The one, the only.
    THANK GOD!!!
  13. And it was a resounding failure on two counts... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The sharks were ultimately not willing to go along with being electrically-shocked for more than a half hour at a time and no medium-sized shark had any real load-carrying ability.

  14. thats why they developed a taste for humans by aod7br · · Score: 1

    We deserve to be eaten

  15. Meanwhile ,the Army ... by PPH · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... is working on a land shark.

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
    1. Re:Meanwhile ,the Army ... by TarPitt · · Score: 1

      I knew eventually Jimmy Buffet would work on a highly classified military project

      --
      If your children ever found out how lame you are, they'd murder you in your sleep
    2. Re:Meanwhile ,the Army ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...with frickin' lasers?

  16. Sharknado 5! by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

    Sharknado 5!

  17. Not just sharks by Deadstick · · Score: 1

    http://www.businessinsider.com...

  18. Why did the summary not mention mules? by blindseer · · Score: 1

    I found the article quite interesting, mostly because of the mention at the end about the use of beasts of burden on land to carry an explosive to a target.

    I'm reminded of something I read a long time ago about some sort of college experiment, competition, or whatever of people trying to race horses by remote control. They strapped a kind of robot to the back of a race horse that could handle a harness and a whip. I don't recall the point of doing this, or at least what point they had in mind, but with reading this article I can see the potential utility.

    There are a lot of questions about whether a horse, ox, mule, or whatever would be an improvement over using some sort of mechanical transportation device. There are certainly some ethical questions, as touched on in the article. I will say that if strapping a bomb to a mule, have it wander into enemy territory, and then blow it and enemy asse(t)s to pieces does save the lives of our warriors then I'm all for it. I'm not going to place the value of a mule over that of human lives.

    There is certainly value in this research, if only to know what an enemy combatant might be capable of and how to counter it.

    --
    I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
  19. Just indoctrinate them with the Koran by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Then they won't need to be shocked into being a splodeydope.

  20. Perhaps the project was motivated in WWII ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... by the notorious problems suffered with the U.S.'s conventional torpedoes.

  21. sharks away.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    sharkpedo in the water. (I suppose "fish" in the water still works)

  22. I read that they used dolphins... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I read that they used dolphins to deliver "packages" from the U.S. Navy to targets in Haiphong harbor in the Second Indochinese War (in the Sixties). The U.S. HAS NO HONOR!!!!!

  23. GOVERNMENT TECH === FBI TECH STORY AGAIN!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Everything on Slashdot is government now.