Since the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. military has used chickens as chemical weapons sensors, dolphins as mine detectors, and armor-wearing dogs as controllers of unruly crowds. And, generally, two-legged soldiers have been grateful for the four-legged and finned assists.
Members of the insect community, however, have been downright pissed. They hate evil-doers just as much as the next genus. And they’ve been itching to get in on the action.
Luckily, Roland tells us, the little buggers may soon get their chance. Researchers funded by Darpa (of course) are training honey bees to sniff out land mines.
Bees… can be trained in a couple of days to pick up the scent of the explosive in the landmine… When released into a minefield, the bees find their way toward the mines… [They] are too small to detect either with the naked eye or high-resolution video at long ranges. So instead, the team employs a laser emitter that sweeps an area like radar or sonar. When the light hits a bee, it reflects, and sensors are able to tell by the reflection just where the bee is. After sweeping several times, the scientists are able to crunch the data and see statistically where the higher occurrences of bees are located.
In controlled situations, the method is extremely effective: Bees can detect very small traces of explosive vapors with 97% accuracy and are “wrong” — that is, passing over a mine without noticing it — less than 1% of the time.
THERE’S MORE: Animal lovers, be sure to read up on England’s chicken-powered nuke, the Navy’s plan to give sailors the sharks’ electric sensors, one police department’s camera-equipped pooch, and another’s attempt to put a trained monkey on the SWAT team.
AND MORE: Reader DG notes that this “is not a new idea.” Back in 1999, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories were training mine-sniffing bees of their own.
AND MORE: “This reminds me of a funny quote I saw about the use of dolphins, from an Aussie navy guy working with them in clearing Iraq’s Um Qasr harbor,” says Defense Tech pal Peter Singer.
‘Flipper’s fucked, mate. The dolphins have had all this amazing publicity but as soon as they put one in the water it shot through. There’s a war going on and Flipper goes AWOL. If you put one to work in Sydney Harbour it would mark a million things because it can’t tell the difference between a washing machine and a mine. The bottom line, mate, is it’s a fish. It’s also a very smart fish so how do you know it hasn’t just gone off for a feed instead of working and then thought, ‘Hang on, I’d better mark a few things or they won’t give me any fish when I get back.’
I commented a previous artile with just the same:
Sniffing is a waste of time for explosives detection in a landscape. A very high false alarm rate can be provoked.
Germany used dogs to detect mines on railroad lines in Russia in WW2. The partisans observed that and dispersed very small amounts of explosives on many places along the long railroad lines.
The dogs had an extreme false alarm rate and were simply useless due to this simple counter.
To invest money in high-tech projects proposed by academics just to be out-smarted by uneducated peasants that are part-time guerillas is one of the most stupid things to do in warfare.
I’m not surprised that the stupid sniffing idea has a comeback about every year. Militaries have a very bad memeory for past lessons, not lesssons learned bureaucracy helps against that.
hmmm.… deadly, deadly bees.…
The reality remains: in war people die. Freedom demands the blood of the brave. Thank God for the brave!
Bravo!
It is just amazing how we are finding so many ways to use Gods creations to help save human lives.
That’s freaking crazy!
god’s creations.… to save human lives… in a holy war sanctioned by god? what are we? guinea pigs?
How much are we going to pay for this. Also how many soldiers lives are we going to risk.…
The money we spend on stupid stuff! In a Book called THE TUNNELS OF CU CHI it seems we built Cu Chi right over 500 miles of VC underground Headquarters. Both sides decided it was an ideal spot and the VC had started it to fight the French, so we did all kinds of things to sniff out tunnels including using bedbugs, that’s right, bedbugs. They give off a certain vibration or something when around the urea in sweat and urine. We called in airstrikes on bags full of waterbuffalo urine. and of course US soldiers set them off also. The commanding VC general said we never found the third tier of tunnels, they’ed come out at night , shoot somebody and go back in their holes and now have a museum to show how they made undetectable tunnel entrances right in Cu Chi. I think I like the way the Marines I’ve talked to clear a path through a minefield. with explosives, better! I’ve got a great bridge between Fernandina and Jacksonville I’ll sell the pentagon cheap! Joe.
I SERVED 3 YRS.IN THE ARMY.—AND BELIEVE ANY TIME YOU CAN USE ANIMAL’S IN THE ARMY TO SAVE HUMAN LIVES GO FOR IT —-IF PETA OR ANY OTHER GROUP DON’T AGREE—-SEND THEM TO TAKE THE ANIMAL’S PLACE —-THIS WOULD PROVE THEY LOVE ANIMALS MORE THAN SOLDIERS– THANKS FOR GETTING THE CHANCE TO EXPRESS MY OPINION—X–SOLDIER
I agree with the X-soldier…bet thing something from the army could have said.
Military Joke…just kidding, but he makes the most sense.
During WWII the acadamics wanted to tie fire bombs on bats and drop them over Japan. I don’t think the silly season is ever over when we are fighting a war.
I’m with X-Soldier. We have a kitten, a puppy and, yes, a guinea pig…all 3 of whom we love to death and would fight over if anyone tried to steal or harm them. But when animals, pets, sense their owners are in danger, they will try to protect them, even at the risk of their own lives.
My son is headed overseas. I would go with him if I was allowed (Moms can be a real force to contend with, you know!), but obviously, that is not possible. And if we could send our dog with him to help protect him and his buddies, we would do it. I love my son beyond reason. So do his sisters and brothers.
I weep for the families of those soldiers who have given their lives for the freedoms, however poorly enforced, that we enjoy.
Whatever it takes, dogs, cats, guinea pigs, dolphins or bees…DO IT. I want my son home alive. I want his buddies’ families to know joy at the return of their sons and daughters…alive.
Use animals in combat? Of course I say yes.
The only question then remaining is raw, cooked, and if possibly, marinated, first?
I personally suggest any kind of hot peppers, shoyu, ginger, seseme or olive oil, and high seared heat.
But mostly still love the lovely taste of say, raw chuck steak strips, soaked in shoyu and chopped garlic long enough to soak it in… Gotta do what you gotta do… Elk is good that way, too.
Hmmm… Bee salad, anyone? Imagine a nice combo of dandelion greens, wild onions, bee parts, seseme oil, some vinegar and…?
Ah! Don’t forget the garlic!
… or the dogs with bees in their mouths, and when they bark they shoot bees at you!
Do Whatever is posible to decrease the number of casualty at war, and using robots, insects and/or animal are no exception. However, it would be better if the best method for searching mine fields it robots. whatelse can i say!
I’ve been to Iraq and served in the Green Zone in Baghdad as well as up North where there are many, many mine fields. I see people have complained about how much money we’ll spend on this crap, but I say “who cares?” Who cares how much money this costs (although I can’t imagine it would be that much). If this saves even one American life of one of my friends over there or of one of your family members over there, isn’t it worth it? This is what we need…for the military to think outside of the box. Too often in the military we are used to doing something a certain way and we don’t think of extremely different ways that something could be accomplished. Do you know what the alternative to using bees is to find mines? What they teach currently is for a soldier to use his bayonette…a simply knife…to poke the ground at a certain angle where it SHOULD tap the mine but not set it off…HOPEFULLY. Now, does the use of bees sound so bad? Didn’t think so!
If using animals saves lives, Good, I gotta ask though. How many military personnel and or civilians profit from wasteful spending every day. sure we have 133K soldiers in Iraq. How many do their job? How many civilians are there over here doing the job for them. While the soldiers are doing bullshit details. The civilians make big bucks while we are stuck here making minimal.This is not a war. this is an occupation after a hostile takeover. Being here doesn’t keep the Americans any more free. The towers were hit because of bullshit security. Bullshit boarder security and not just from Mexico.
What I find so odd is: We have a telescope that can see for miles out into space and we have satelites that can see the numbers on a license plate from miles out in space and planes that can fly almost totally undetected by radar but yet we can’t see insurgents at night planting bombs along a dirty dusty road. I’m amazed.…So we have to rely on Bee’s
Raymond, a very astute observation.
Hey Joe monkeyman,
good work with the simpson line!!!
Raymond is right! You would think by now that we would have satalites all over Iraq, especially near roadway from airport to downtown Baghdad. They should be able to see the placement of bombs,and send out a massive signal to explode the bombs while the bad guys are still installing them!
I just turned 70, retired Army, and my heart is with all of our guys & gals who are in harms way, and hope for their safe return.
God Bless, and use Dogs, Fish, Bees, and whatever else is available.
Whatever we can do to help our soldiers I am for it. I love animals and don’t get me wrong I would never want them to be placed in unnecessary danger, but if someone asked me what I valued more, my Army boyfriend’s life or a bee.…hmmmm…what do you think I would pick? I hope they continue to “think outside the box” and come up with more ways to help reduce the danger for our brave men and women.
If you can use bees to detect IED’s, go for it. But how many Marines/ soldiers you think are gonna be carrying around bees in their humvees, or even EOD, a good idea, but I don’t see it happening in Iraq.
If bees can save one american life i say great . who cares how much it cost after all we give congress people a lot of money to look out for their own best intrest. I read an article where the goverment spent millons to find out why mice don’t like cheese. where are our priorities?
I have a younger brother that will be going over seas to fight for our freedom and I say that if using bees and other animals will help save American lives then do it. And I would like to say thanks to all the soldiers that have fought or are fighting for our freedom. GOD BLESS the US
No matter how technical the environment is or will be, we are and will benefit what nature serves in all possible ways.