Thankfully, DIY Drones says, “Amateur UAVs are non-military and non-commercial.”
Nevertheless, they may be annoying and dangerous.
Both military and civilian attempts at capabilities similar to UAVs wisely included an abort/self-destruct feature to avoid the catastrophic consequences that malfunctions cause. And where is the “anti-drone” capability – the capability to detect, prevent, intercept, and destroy drones? Whether a legal, moral, and ethical drone malfunctions or one is designed to be a mal-drone may make little difference to the victims. Counter-drone capabilities plus laws and prosecution will never be enough.
Consider –
- A small drone that slowly releases white powder while circling 80,000 people in a stadium
- A drone that targets the President during a speech on the West Lawn of the White House
- Using drones, all police cars, armored vehicles, or Senators are located on a Google map
- Drug smugglers use drones to carry their payload
- A flock of small drones flies into the engines of an aircraft (from Air Force One to take-your-pick)
- Exposed, outdoor electrical power facilities are hit at multiple, strategic points
Strategically, responsible UAV enthusiasts are the experts that must produce safe UAVs and anti-UAVs.
Comments
- Using drones, all police cars, armored vehicles, or Senators are located on a Google map
I agree. It would be very embarrasing finding out your senators spend most of their time at brothels.
Just cover your quad with disco ball mirrors.
Practical and stylish.
Interesting that economics is a concern.
I mentioned The President, Senators, banks, police, border-patrol drones, crowds, and electricity users. How much would you think it is worth to disable or eliminate these? The relatively low cost and the dramatically increasing capability of UAVs indeed relieve constraints and thus makes this an engineering problem.
UAV enthusiasts have an opportunity (and the responsibility) to develop anti-drone capabilities and to influence laws (before politicians, terrorized public, commercial interests, etc. do).
p.s., A bit of humor is permitted in brainstorming, but great ideas come from crowd thought.
Sounds like a tiger-repellent rock. Ratheon should solve the very real problem of goodyear blimp hijackings next.
Seriously though, outside Israel's problems with HAMAS and the FBI's terror plot, is there any reason to be concerned about these Tom Clancy plot-lines?
I think it's an interesting engineering problem, and at a <50kW Ratheon sounds like they're selling an appropriately sized hammer relative to the scale of the problem. When I first saw the article I thought this was the Tactical High Energy Laser rebranded for a new application. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tactical_High_Energy_Laser
The cost of firing that at a $100 Easy Star is obviously bad business, but 50kW seems more reasonable.
I'm just wonder what other sorts of UFOs we can sell giant lasers with? Comets? Thrown shoes? Kamikaze Ultralights? Engorged pigeons?
Then again, this type of nay-saying may be the origin of "generals always fight the last war" quotes.