It’s not too early to be thinking about Christmas, folks. So for that hard-to-please gift recipient, we’ve brought you a perfect solution to your conundrum.
Think a Nork nuke attack or a poor-man’s radiological bomb — you’re just minding your own business playing fantasy football or reading DoD Buzz and *BOOM* the evildoers pop off a 50 gallon drum of old X-ray machines wrapped in C4 sprinkling nuclear fallout all over your favorite dog park.
Nukepills.com (don’t you love that name?), an online provider of radiation mitigation medication, sent out a release announcing its new Dirty Bomb Emergency Kit for when the sh&!t really hits the fan…
The Dirty Bomb Emergency Kit is used to instantly detect radiation and safely, quickly and significantly decontaminate people and surfaces of radioactive material most likely found in a dirty bomb using the supplied Quick-Decon resin-based decontamination solutions. The included military-grade RADTriage Personal Radiation Detectors instantly detect radiation exposure in the event of a dirty bomb, nuclear reactor accident, nuclear weapon fallout and other sources of radiation.
(FULL DISCLOSURE: I’ve always wanted a personal radiation detector)
The web site says the kit costs $250 and works on the entire family. So if you live near Three Mile Island, Manhattan or DC, it might be worth asking Santa for one of these just to be on the safe side.
The Pentagon has shown it has a great appetite for drones and robots — everything from missile-firing UAVs to prototype patrol-bots guarding air base perimeters.
But a Maryland company working on a program for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, DARPA, has the idea of giving the robots their own appetites, letting them feed on biomass as a means of fueling themselves.
But as the image of flesh-eating drones refueling off the battlefield dead has spread in recent days, Cyclone Power Technologies of Florida, the company developing the robot’s engine, has issued a statement about the Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot’s — aka EATR — diet.
It is vegetarian, the company said in a press statement released Thursday, in response to stories with headlines such as “Dawn of the corpse-eating robots?” and “Pentagon contracts company for flesh-eating robots.”
“We completely understand the public’s concern about futuristic robots feeding on the human population, but that is not our mission,” Harry Schoell, chief executive officer of Cyclone, said in the statement. “We are focused on demonstrating that our engines can create usable, green power from plentiful, renewable plant matter. The commercial applications alone for this earth-friendly energy solution are enormous.”
EATR is being developed by Robotic Technology Inc. of Maryland under a program sponsored by DARPA. EATR is envisioned as a robotic platform able to conduct long-range, long-endurance missions without the need for manual or conventional refueling, Cyclone explained in its statement.
Cyclone said RTI’s EATER will be able to find, ingest and extract energy from biomass — that is, “twigs, grass clippings and wood chips — small, plant-based items for which RTI’s robotic technology is designed to forage.
“Desecration of the dead is a war crime under Article 15 of the Geneva Conventions, and is certainly not something sanctioned by DARPA, Cyclone or RTI,” the company said.
Our boy Bob Cox at the Ft. Worth Star Telegram sent me a hilarious blurb he wrote for his paper on an embarrassing admission by one of Bell’s top officials recently.
Bob spotted an interesting little vehicle prototype a few years ago at the international air show in Farnborough and wrote about the thing, which looks a bit like Luke Skywalker’s land speeder from Star Wars IV, and it sort of ended there…
FARNBOROUGH, England George Jetson would have loved this one. If only hed been a space cop, not a sprocket-company employee.
On Monday at the Farnborough International Airshow, Bell Helicopter announced that it will team with an Israeli company to develop a futuristic aircraft that would allow soldiers and police far greater mobility in cities.
The X-Hawk, as envisioned by Bell, could hold a pilot and up to 11 troops. It could navigate congested urban areas by flying above narrow streets and between closely spaced buildings.
Propelled by two jet turbine engines that would drive pusher propellers and downward-thrust lift fans, similar to those on the short-takeoff-vertical-landing version of the F-35 Lightning II, the X-Hawk could operate in spaces far more confined than a helicopter can.
Mark Gibson, Bells vice president of advanced concept development, said the X-Hawk is not something out of a science fiction film.
“People look at this and say Star Wars, but theyve been building these since the 1950s,” Gibson said.
That is until a little luncheon last week with the Fort Worth chamber of commerce where a curious attendee asked Bell CEO Richard Millman what that weird thing in the corner of the hanger was…
The prototype, a sort of airborne hovercraft, is still sitting in a hangar at Bells Alliance Airport facility. And CEO Richard Millman apparently has no intention of pursuing the project.
At a Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce luncheon hosted by Bell at the Alliance hangar Thursday, Millman was asked what the odd-looking object in the corner was.
“How embarrassing,” Millman said sheepishly, as if asked about a daffy relative wandering loose.
“That was a mistake. Built before I got here. I wish wed never done it.”
And Millman is right. Too vulnerable, too slow, too rickety. But kind of a cool idea. I’ve got to admit, I wouldn’t mind giving one a test drive over the crowded commuter routes of the DC area. And hey, the Jetsons know it’s inevitable, right?
EDITOR’S NOTE:Greetings folks…I’ve been in touch with David Crane from Defense Review who was interested in a little content swap between our two organizations and I thought I’d give it a whirl. This is his first entry in the experiment and I’m hoping we can get a little feedback from you folks on some of his more provocative content.
My good friend and professional contact, prolific infantry small arms/machine gun designer Jim Sullivan (a.k.a. L James Sullivan), has complained to me quite a bit about U.S. military infantry warfighters not having an American version of the Russian RPG-7 / RPG-7V shoulder-launched, anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade weapon system (recoilless rifle) at their disposal to match our current and potential future enemies RPG-7s / RPG-7Vs. The advantages of the RPG-7 anti-tank weapon system are several.
First, the size of the RPG-7s warhead/projectile is not limited to the size of the launcher tube, so you can use variable-size warheads that carry more payload and greater penetrative capability than an M72 LAW (Light Anti-Tank Weapon a.k.a. Light Anti-Armor Weapon) 66mm HEAT warhead. Second, the RPG-7s reloadable/reusable aspect allows the user to carry a quiver of different types of RPG rounds (i.e. standard HEAT warhead, dual-HEAT warhead, and thermobaric rocket-propelled grenades) on his back and quickly choose the best one for the job, load it, fire it at the target, and then reach back and grab the next one in the quiver (or have his buddy grab it for him), load it, and fire it again, which may offer some tactical advantages over carrying multiple disposable rocket launchers on his back. And third, both the the RPG-7 and enhanced-armor-penetration-capable RPG-29 Vampir (Vampire) recoilless rifles respective launcher tubes, ammunition (grenade rounds), and training requirements are significantly less expensive than the U.S. militarys closest equivalents, the M3 Carl-Gustaf 84mm Recoilless Rifle / Multi-Role Man-Portable Anti-Tank Weapon a.k.a. M3 Carl-Gustav Recoilless Anti-Tank Rifle made by Saab AB a.k.a. Saab Bofors Dynamics and the Shoulder-launched Multipurpose Assault Weapon (SMAW) MK153 Mod 0, which is an 83mm multi-purpose recoilless rifle.
The M3 Carl-Gustaf is, no doubt, an excellent weapon system, but it is cost-prohibitive (i.e. too expensive) for many armies to procure it in large numbers. The M3 Carl-Gustafs relatively high cost (launcher, ammo, and training) has even contributed to its relatively limited numbers in the U.S. military inventory. The U.S. version is designated as the M3 MAAWS (Multi-role Anti-Armor Anti-personnel Weapon System), and is primarily in use with U.S. military Special Operations Forces (SOF) under USSOCOM a.k.a. SOCOM.
Enter the good folks at Airtronic USA, Inc. who have recently developed an American-version a.k.a. Amerikansky RPG-7 / RPG-7V with a couple of M4/M4A1-Carbine-type features that U.S. military infantry warfighters should enjoy (see features below), and its about time somebody did. Quite frankly, an American-made RPG-7 / RPG-7V system is long, long overdue.
Airtronic USA RPG-7 Features:
- Mil-Std-1913 Quad Rail System for mounting combat opics (optical sights), flip-up BUIS (Back Up Iron Sights), aiming lasers/illuminators, tactical white lights, and vertical foregips
It may be chalked up by historians as the most catastrophic intelligence failure of all time, but for the Air Force, it seems to be an opportunity to dance in the end zone.
One of the main justifications for the invasion of Iraq — what many critics say offered the Bush administration a bumper sticker sales pitch for overthrowing Saddam Hussein in 2003 — was the contention that Baghdad had stockpiles of WMD that was too great a risk to allow to potentially slip into terrorist hands.
Now, I beg you dear reader not to rehash this argument…that’s not the point of the post. But while nearly everyone in the U.S. (and foreign) security establishment deserves at least some penalty for getting it wrong, the Air Force deserves laurels for making that crashing intel screw up possible.
Listening to Lt. Gen. Robert Elder, the Air Force’s top Global Strike commander and 8th Air Force chief, at a breakfast meeting today with reporters in Washington I was struck by the contention that it was indeed the Air Force’s success that led to the Bush administration (and nearly the entire intel community) failure on WMD in Iraq.
Listen to this:
“We’re real excited about the success of Northern Watch and Southern Watch which was there to enforce the U.N. Security Council resolutions — two of them, one for the north, of course, was to protect the Kurds, in the south, the Shiia, but the third one had to do with preventing Saddam Hussein from developing weapons of mass destruction which was a pretty successful operation.”
Of course, the logic follows that Elder has a point here. But I guess it took the passing of the previous administration for a top Air Force general to get the gumption to actually celebrate the service’s contribution to an intelligence failure that led to an invasion of Iraq and its bloody aftermath.
In case you didn’t see this elsewhere, Lockheed Martin recently unveiled a down-scale competitor to the exoskeleton wars. At the February Association of the US Army symposium, LockMart introduced its Human Universal Load Carrier system.
According to LockMart, the HULC can help a Soldier carry up to 200 pounds “with minimal effort.”
HULC transfers the weight from heavy loads to the ground through the battery-powered, titanium legs of the lower-body exoskeleton. An advanced onboard micro-computer ensures the exoskeleton moves in concert with the individual. HULCs completely un-tethered, hydraulic-powered anthropomorphic exoskeleton design allows for deep squats, crawls and upper-body lifting with minor exertion.
Look, you know I’m partial to Troy Hurtubise’s Trojan II, but I’ve got to hand it to LockMart — the HULC seems to take the middle ground between being a full-on exoskeleton and a passive assistance device to help carry heavy loads. I can see 240 gunners and mortarmen eating this thing up, trudging through the Afghan hills a lot more easily than before. Maybe the HULC could give planners more options by making organic indirect fire support a viable alternative for platoons in the bush.
Obviously it looks a bit ungainly in the video, but in the end, if it does what the video shows and with a few ergonomic tweaks, we’ll see a workable option in the field soon. With all the news about load stress on Soldiers’ bodies these days, why not use technology to ease the burden?
Those of us whove laid there for hours on end, watching a suspected insurgent ORP, or gathering intel on that homicide suspect before the knuckle-draggers go serve the warrant, understand that adult diapers arent the best answer to the bodys biological imperatives (particularly with regards to matters scatological). The same thing is true (and possibly even more serious, just ask them) for those poor bastards trying to make it through a heroic run of Utgard Keep in one night, or attempting to finish Dire Maul while suffering gastrointestinal distress.
Well, the Japanese have created something that will not only eliminate those troubles, itll let you leave the atmosphere without crapping yourself. This space diaper is designed to use powerful suction to gather up all the nastiness created when nature calls. Sensors strategically placed around your ass and crotch let the diaper know when to activate, and it will even dry and clean up its wearer after the fact. JAXA, Japans equivalent to our NASA, wants to have the space diaper finished and ready for deployment within the next five years. Thats conceivably in time for the guys slated for deployment in OEF XXIV or so…
CAPE CANAVERAL — NASA is telling museums across the country that have expressed interest in obtaining a genuine space shuttle that it’s really going to cost them.
How much? A mere $42 million — including $6 million for shipping and handling.
That’s NASA’s price tag for cleaning up each of the three remaining shuttles — now scheduled to be retired in 2010 — and delivering one to an airport near the museum.
NASA has never charged institutions such as the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum — which wants at least one of the orbiters — for rockets, capsules and other artifacts.
But Wednesday, the agency issued a “Request for Information” to gauge museums’ interest in obtaining a shuttle — and the depth of their pockets. At least five locations across the country — including Kennedy Space Center — have expressed interest in displaying an orbiter.
The RFI serves “to notify potential recipients of NASA’s intent to require potential recipients to assume all costs associated with transfer of these assets,” it states.
Another purpose is “identifying whether potential recipient organizations are capable of bearing the full cost of Space Shuttle Orbiter safing and final display preparation …”
“Safing” means decontamination of the ship’s fuel systems — including toxic hydrazine — and removal of other safety and environmental hazards.
NASA spokesman Mike Curie said that, although NASA generally has not charged museums for relics, the agency recognizes that there is now a market for space artifacts. What’s more, he said, some museums allowed Apollo-era relics to deteriorate because they got them for free.
The U.S. Army will open up two islands in Second Life in the next 30–45 days aimed at recruiting new soldiers. The plans were announced at the Army Science Conference this week, which has a heavy focus on immersive technologies. The project sounds similar to the current implementation of the Air Forces MyBase, which opened in Second Life yesterday. Users will find a welcome center with information and links to contact a recruiter on one island and military-themed activities like rappelling, shooting, and parachuting on the other. Completing the activities will earn users points toward free Army-branded virtual goods.
You’ll remember that we reported in a preview of the Army Science Conference that the service was planning to enter massively multiplayer online games with virtual humans to try and trick real ones into believing the digital Soldiers were made of more than 1s and 0s. Well, don’t look now, but that digital dude in the cammo pants and jaunty beret could be giving you a virtual pitch to be an Army of One.
Dr. Parmentola mentioned this video a colleague of his sent to him the other day, so I tracked it down and embeded it here for DT readers.
I just got finished reading an excellent SciFi book titled “Old Man’s War” (I had already read the “Ghost Brigades”) and it talks about a brain-embedded computer called a “brain pal.” Well, it looks like we’re closer to that than many had once thought.
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