Defense

How to Make a Giant Chain Gun Even Deadlier: Give It a Laser Cannon!

BAE System’s Mk 38 chain gun was already a formidable opponent: a 250millimeter cannon capable of putting 180 rounds per minute into the air from the deck of a naval ship, strongly urging those without clearance to keep a safe distance (of about 2,000 yards). But in a tip of the hat toward what the…

io9 Clay Dillow - Popular Science Jul 26

How today’s military is using lasers to blow things up and light stuff on fire

Lasers have become common since their invention in the 1960s. We use them every day to read optical media like DVDs, to see if our shelves are level, measure distances, or just to point at things. There are lots of medical and industrial uses for lasers too, but what we really want to know is…

io9 Ed Grabianowski Jul 22

The “Blackfish” Is a Robotic Jetski That Scares Terrorists

We already have flying robots. Robotic UAVs already dot the skies in considerable numbers for the military. But what about swimming ones? The Blackfish, a 10-foot long remote-controlled jet ski, is being tested by the Navy to defend wartime waters. Designed by British defense contractor Qinetiq, the Blackfish was developed to respond to small watercraft…

Tech News Kwame Opam Jul 20

The craziest experimental weapons of the 19th century

With weird western Cowboys & Aliens coming out next week, we couldn’t help but wonder: were there any real 19th century weapons that could compare to Daniel Craig’s alien energy weapon? As always, never underestimate the awesome craziness of the 19th century. Of course, none of the weapons we’re about to talk about can compare…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins Jul 20

Congressman Claims 1/5 of the Navy’s Ships Are Junk

It looks like dissolving ships aren’t the only thing the Navy’s only anxiety—even the proven stuff is starting to fall apart, Danger Room reports. According to a congressional report, over a fifth of the country’s fleet fails inspections. https://gizmodo.com/builder-blames-navy-as-brand-new-warship-disintegrates-5814840 The findings, dispatched by Republican Rep. Randy Forbes, Chair of the House Armed Services Readiness Subcommittee,…

Tech News Sam Biddle Jul 14

Allied planes unintentionally changed the weather during World War II

Allied bombing raids during World War II “inadvertently experimented on the weather” in England by creating massive concentrations of artificial clouds as the planes roared off toward continental Europe. Researchers quoted by New Scientist claim that “where the aircraft circled and assembled into formation,” on one particular day back in 1944 for which military, meteorological,…

io9 Geoff Manaugh - BLDGBLOG Jul 10

Spies want to mine your tweets for signs of the next tsunami

The intelligence community has seen the future, and the future is Google Trends. Actually, more like a highly sophisticated version of Google Trends, with Twitter and YouTube thrown in for good measure. Iarpa, the blue-sky research arm of the intelligence community, recently announced a new program that aims to monitor, collect and analyze publicly available…

io9 Lena Groeger - Danger Room Jul 10

Genius computer stops rockets right before impact

Blowing up rockets in midflight is easy – as long as you’ve got a fast enough computer. That’s the thinking at Artis, the Virginia firm trying to outfit the Army’s armored vehicles with so-called “active protection” technology – defenses that can stop incoming projectiles before they ever have a chance to hit. If the approach…

io9 Noah Shachtman - Danger Room Jun 25

A fleet of Navy ghost ships, right out of the Bermuda Triangle

Not the real Bermuda Triangle — the fictional one where Cthulhu, Amelia Earhart, and Aqua-Sasquatch chill out drinking Bay Breezes. This is actually a photo of the Navy’s eerie mothballed fleet in Suisun Bay, 30 miles north of San Francisco. Photographer Scott Haefner and his colleagues evaded military patrol vessels to photograph these floating behemoths,…

io9 Cyriaque Lamar Jun 14

It’s Once Again Time to Worry About Russian Lasers

It looks like X-Men: First Class isn’t the only thing cashing in on Cold War nostalgia this summer. Russia may also be reaching back to the past by reviving a Soviet-era laser project. Way back when (in 1977), the Soviets started putting a laser cannon on an Ilyushin-76 jet. Two models existed, one was put…

io9 Katharine Trendacosta Jun 14

Scenes from an open-air airplane graveyard in the Russian Far East

If you ever find yourself 60 miles north of Vladivostok in the city of Ussuriysk, you can visit the crumbling Vozdvizhenka Air Base, where gutted planes sit in the open for trespassers to explore. Crazily enough, security’s nonexistent here. The Ussuriysk base was home to 444th Heavy Bomber Aviation Regiment and Tupolev jets until the…

io9 Cyriaque Lamar Jun 11

See the evolution of the US military’s robotic hummingbird

Remember that robotic hummingbird DARPA built? Now they’ve released a short video detailing how their pint-sized drone was developed over the course of five years. Check out some skittering prototype robobirds crashing and burning. http://io9.com/5764497/robotic-hummingbird-ornithopter-is-right-out-of-a-james-bond-film [Via DARPA]

io9 Cyriaque Lamar Jun 5

Air Force’s robotic bags will pack themselves

The Air Force is sick of packing the military’s crap. So it’s starting to contract it out – to robots. The Air Force is responsible for lugging around the rest of the military’s gear. Pallets are the workhorses that crews use to get the job done. They’re flat planks that support cargo and allow it…

io9 Adam Rawnsley - Danger Room Jun 4

Army tanks should be bright pink with Escher drawings on them

Dull, blendy camouflage is not the best thing to wear in war. This has now been scientifically proven. Let us jettison the green and black, and usher in a new era of “dazzle camouflage”. There was a time, a beautiful time, when tanks and ships were painted in bright colors. They were decorated using bold,…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell Jun 3

Take a Peek at the U.S.’s Official Non-Denial Denial About the Stuxnet Virus

Remember Stuxnet? Iran sure does—it nearly crippled their hazily-defined nuclear program. U.S. involvement was always rumored, but never confirmed. That’s still the case, even after Dep. Defense Sec. William Lynn’s non-denial this week, but, I mean, come on. [BB] https://gizmodo.com/israels-dimona-nuclear-facility-splits-time-as-cyberwea-5734934

Tech News Jack Loftus May 29

After World War II, they predicted we’d be wearing aluminum dresses and flying plywood airplanes

American companies during World War II often stressed sacrifice in their print advertising. If we can all just be patient, they promised, we’ll have more televisions and personal helicopters and push-button kitchens than you can shake a rocket car at. The June 24, 1945 San Antonio Express ran an article by Associated Press science writer…

io9 Matt Novak - Paleofuture Blog May 14

Ancient chemical weapons that were ahead of their time

Even in the early days of humanity, people were lazy. They wanted a way to kill each other without having to go to all the trouble of bashing each other’s heads in with rocks. So they turned to better living (briefly) through chemistry. Find out how wolf crap and chilis won wars. No one knows…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell May 4

Pentagon plots comic book therapy for troops

The fighting was furious, and entirely one-sided. While on patrol in eastern Afghanistan’s Paktia province in December 2002, paratroopers from the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division had taken a wrong turn and blundered straight into one of Paktia’s isolated villages. The villagers weren’t Taliban or even Taliban sympathizers. But they were heavily armed – and…

Books & Comics David Axe - Danger Room May 1

Aerial mine fields = a great bad idea that never happened

In this diagram from a 1937 issue of Popular Science, the magazine pitched the idea of defensive aerial mind fields, filled with daintily parachuting explosives that would float down to earth for Lord knows who to clean up. In all seriousness, I do find it kind of quaint that the past imagined the future as…

io9 Cyriaque Lamar Apr 30

Enormous waterjet boat could be the next generation of warships

Waterjet boats are propelled by a fast jet of water that’s forced through pumps and shot out of the back of the ship. And now the military is implanting this technology in huge boats to make them achieve super speeds. The ferry you see here is a concept design from Incat, and is under construction…

io9 Annalee Newitz Apr 19

How to Make a Giant Chain Gun Even Deadlier: Give It a Laser Cannon!

How today’s military is using lasers to blow things up and light stuff on fire

The “Blackfish” Is a Robotic Jetski That Scares Terrorists

The craziest experimental weapons of the 19th century

Congressman Claims 1/5 of the Navy’s Ships Are Junk

Allied planes unintentionally changed the weather during World War II

Spies want to mine your tweets for signs of the next tsunami

Genius computer stops rockets right before impact

A fleet of Navy ghost ships, right out of the Bermuda Triangle

It’s Once Again Time to Worry About Russian Lasers

Scenes from an open-air airplane graveyard in the Russian Far East

See the evolution of the US military’s robotic hummingbird

Air Force’s robotic bags will pack themselves

Army tanks should be bright pink with Escher drawings on them

Take a Peek at the U.S.’s Official Non-Denial Denial About the Stuxnet Virus

After World War II, they predicted we’d be wearing aluminum dresses and flying plywood airplanes

Ancient chemical weapons that were ahead of their time

Pentagon plots comic book therapy for troops

Aerial mine fields = a great bad idea that never happened

Enormous waterjet boat could be the next generation of warships

‘Good Omens’ Season 3 Is Still Just One Episode, Despite Being Called That

Steam Gaming Has Arrived on Apple Vision Pro, and It’s Unexpectedly Glorious

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The Spymaster’s Guide to the Secret Agencies of ‘Star Trek’

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