A robot cannon began wildly and autonomously firing its huge gun in South Africa last Friday, killing 9 soldiers and wounding 14. The Oerlikon GDF-005 antiaircraft gun suddenly began uncontrollably shooting as it swung back and forth, spraying hundreds of high-explosive 35mm cannon shells all over the place. The crazed robot’s handlers are still trying to figure out what sort of software bug would cause such mayhem. The video you see above is not the actual incident, but is a similar occurrence from a few years ago when an XM-151 remote weapons station filled the air with lead, and then spun around toward the reviewing stand in search of even more targets. Hey, good thing it had run out of those .50 caliber bullets, or else it would have laid waste to some pretty important suits. These robots, they’re going to take over the world, I tell ya. [Danger Room]
