That is seriously pretty cool though, particularly the part about the dramatic reduction in collateral damage (something that had never occurred to me but seems obvious in retrospect. ) I think Lucas might sue when he sees the prototype aircraft in the picture though. I'm a little curious what "defeated" means, however; are we talking about a meter wide hole trough the drivers door, or a smoking crater? It'll be more impressive when they can hit a MOVING target, too, even if I recall the statement Bill Mauldin once had Willie and Joe make to a passing tank offering a lift: "No, thanks; a roving foxhole attracts the eye.... "
'Defeated' get's to be a tricky term. Lasers only do tiny amounts of kinetic damage, and most ground based structures carry enough mass - unlike planes or missiles - that they can absorb the heat pretty easily. Usually regarding lasers they are talking about taking out electronic systems, which screws a jet or missile, but doesn't do much to tanks, howitzers, or APCs. Those Roving Foxholes can absorb just about anything short of a nuclear strike, and even then it needs to be a farirly close hit.
In this case we are definetly not talking about either a meter wide hole in the door or a smoking crater, and most tanks would surive an attack that produced what you and I would think of as a smoking crater anyway. Just to give you an idea, to burn through an inch of steel a meter wide would require energies on an order of a gigajoule which need to be delivered in well under a second, required a multi-gigawatt generator, not counting that few lasers run at anything like 100% efficiency. You want to leave a smoking crater on par with what a large artillery round or cruise missile would cause you looking at needing a laser hooked up to a nuclear reactor, and a big one at that.
No Death Stars today. Probably a good thing, since the kinds of countries who develop that sort of thing are the very last ones you want to have them.
Honorbound and honored to be Bonded to Mahtaliel Sedai
Last First in wotmania Chat
Slightly better than chocolate.
Love still can't be coerced.
Please Don't Eat the Newbies!
LoL. Be well, RAFOlk.
Last First in wotmania Chat
Slightly better than chocolate.
Love still can't be coerced.
Please Don't Eat the Newbies!
LoL. Be well, RAFOlk.
Boeing succesfully tested it's lazer cannon! Now with link!
03/09/2009 05:34:14 AM
- 700 Views
Awesome! Ancient weapons and hokey religions.... you know the rest. *NM*
03/09/2009 06:21:32 AM
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The Android Girl/Boyfriend had compatibility issues, IIRC.
03/09/2009 10:20:19 AM
- 334 Views
Re: The Android Girl/Boyfriend had compatibility issues, IIRC.
03/09/2009 01:20:02 PM
- 420 Views
I suspected as much.
03/09/2009 02:27:09 PM
- 404 Views
Who does Boeing plan to shoot at?
03/09/2009 11:04:03 AM
- 312 Views
Boeing makes, or made, a lot of our military aircraft, too, y'know.
03/09/2009 02:36:15 PM
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