Gizmodo: marines

Augmented Reality Goggles Give Real-Life +50% Speed Boost to Marine Mechanics

matt buchanan — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:20:00 EDT

It's like a real-life Starcraft perk for mechanics repairing armored vehicles: Marine mechanics assisted by augmented-reality goggles with a heads-up display repaired light armored vehicles up to 46 percent faster.

The HUD replaces technical manuals on a bulky laptop with floating instructions, labels and oh yes, 3D models of tools right in front of the mechanic. The wrist-mounted interface is run off an Android-powered G1 (which looks much cooler as gauntlet). Apparently Android's seeing a lot of use as a tool of war. You can check out a video of it here. [Technology Review via PopSci]

Fake Electronic Components Cause Military Malfunctions, Possibly International Espionage

Dan Nosowitz — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 13:00:00 EDT

BusinessWeek reports that counterfeit hardware has been found to be the cause of several malfunctions in high-level military machinery. The phony infiltration has a distinct possibility of leading to espionage or sabotage. In other words, move over, Meizu M8: you're not the biggest faker in town anymore.

Several crashes of military aircraft can be attributed to knockoff chips, but more insidiously, internal military data might be at risk. Melissa E. Hathaway, a head of cybersecurity at the FBI, says, "Counterfeit products have been linked to the crash of mission-critical networks, and may also contain hidden 'back doors' enabling network security to be bypassed and sensitive data accessed [by hackers, thieves, and spies]." Robert P. Ernst, who investigates counterfeiting for the U.S. Navy, estimates that 15% of the spare or replacement microchips bought by the Pentagon are fake. Where do these parts actually come from?

Made in, as BusinessWeek colorfully puts it, the "Chinese hinterland," a lot of these components are made on the cheap and sold to the government for much less than name-brands can offer. To be fair, no evidence of terrifying espionage has been found; all of the problems are due to crappy chips failing to work at the worst times, which really should have been expected, since the military has been paying half the price for the same product.

But you can start to take off that tin foil hat, because steps are being taken. After the inquiries the military has decided to effect a rule requiring the source of all chips be ascertained before they place a bid. I'm satisfied, aren't you? [BusinessWeek]

Boeing Working on Real-Life Colonial Marines Dropship

Jesus Diaz — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:30:00 EDT

The US Air Force wants a new cargo aircraft, a pressurized airplane capable of carrying 65,000 pounds for 1,500 nautical miles without refueling. They call it the Speed Agile Concept Demonstrator—it's supposed to travel at a minimum Mach .8 at 30,000-feet—but they may as well have called it the UD-4L Dropship, because it looks like the Colonial Marines' Cheyenne in Aliens. Boeing is going to get a mere $7.5M to work on it to get the technology ready for 2010—which doesn't mean having the airplane by then, just the pretty drawings for us to post about. [Defense Tech]

ParaNav GPS Unit For Parachutists Helps Marines Avoid Errors...Like This One

Sean Fallon — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 17:30:23 EST

Rockwell Collins has been selected by the US Marines to deliver 3,000 of its ParaNav GPS units for parachutists. Soldiers plummeting towards Earth will soon have the advantage of GPS navigation with a HUD that will help improve landing accuracy and allow for target zones to be easily changed on the fly.

The system itself consists of a GPS unit that connects to the soldiers helmet and a full-color display attaches directly to goggles or helmet shields. It also "contains an 802.11 Wi-Fi interface for Joint Precision Airdrop System data connectivity and custom circuitry that allows for dead reckoning calculations in the event of a GPS lock failure." Plus, it looks like the dude is rockin' a sweet mohawk. [GPS Daily]