Posted on 12/22/2013 7:30:54 AM PST by shove_it
The Army has successfully tested a futuristic laser weapon capable of shooting football-sized mortar rounds and unmanned drones out of the sky. The truck-mounted weapon, known as the High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator (HEL MD) is still about a decade away from becoming an operational part of the Army's arsenal, but gives a hint at what a weapon of the future could look like.
The Army tested its HEL MD laser at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico for nearly six weeks starting in mid-November. The device was equipped with a 10-kilowatt solid state laser and a radar system mounted atop a heavy truck.
During the tests a "quarter-sized" invisible laser beam successfully targeted and destroyed more than 90 incoming mortar rounds and six to seven unmanned drones. Terry Bauer, the project manager for the laser program, said the test results were "above and beyond" what they had expected going into the testing. "We had no thoughts that this 10-kilowatt would be as successful n doing that as it has been. " ...
So far the Army's laser testing program has cost about $13 million a year since it began in 2011. But over the long term it looks like a good deal as the cost of taking out each mortar round is estimated to be the price of a cup of diesel fuel.
(Excerpt) Read more at gma.yahoo.com ...
From what I've read about this laser it's not intended to cause the incoming ordinance to explode. The desired effect is to render it inert.
It seems rather ambitious to me, shooting the whiskers off a flea? Apparently the brass who wrote the specs consider shrapnel falling from airborne detonations is worse than "dud" rounds dropping on your head.
Regards,
GtG
Ahha, the missing piece is revealed when viewed from the other side. Thanks, Joe.
I’ve worked on stuff that wasn’t allowed to be photographed.
I’ve photographed stuff that wasn’t allowed to be worked on.
So we have something in common.
It’s uncomfortable to think somehow we are preserving the balance of the cosmos.
Indeed.
I love a comprehensive reply from someone who knows the subject!
BTW, have you ever seen a current mortar that fires “football sized” rounds? (~ 7 inches/178mm diameter) WWI and WWII used big mortars, but 120mm is about the largest currently in use.
This subject is my second career. I eat and breath this stuff at work every day and I’m loving every miute of it.
The football sized mortar thing made me laugh. If you are going to report on a weapons program it might help you to do a little research on the damn subject you are about to write an article on. Reporters are lazy idiots for the most part.
mortars come in lots of sizes of course
better have miniature ones to combat the swarms of Chinese waspsized drones comin at you.
odumbi will give the damn thing away to Hezzbolah and Hamas.
Absolutely. Or the NorKs or his Chinese overlords.
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