Pentagon officially made public about the latest non-lethal weapon of U.S. called Active Denial System (ADS) or better known as the “Ray Gun”. The cost per unit is $13.1 million… cheap compared to other weapons used by the US Military. It physically doesn’t look like a gun that your hands can hold and don’t expect any thundering sound with an enormous beam of light to come out of it just like you see in kiddie cartoon shows, but instead it is a satellite dish mounted on a humvee vehicle… and one more, it could not kill you (huh?!). Hell yeah, it won’t! Once hit by the ADS, you will feel like being zapped, a feeling that is similar to a blast that comes from a hot oven, it penetrates the nerve endings of the skin enough to cause discomfort and pain but really no lasting harm. Other side effects are rashes, and 2nd to 3rd degree burns.
Now here is the drama. Is ADS really an effective tool to manipulate the enemies of war? From what I saw at the press demo on CBS news, the ADS could only be effective in controlling or dispersing crowds, but in war where high powered guns, grenades, and bombs are involve, this may not be an effective deterrent. Oh this brings me to the fact that on an average/regular day, humidity in Iraq is 37 to 39 degrees Celsius, so if the US Military will use oven heat as weapon (wahahaha this one cracks me up!), they better think again. Isn’t it that one effect of radiation is cancer? Now, that is one big side effect. I like sponge bombs better.
complete story:
It’s a focused microwave emitter, so the cancer risks are low – though not non-existent.
As for its usefulness, that remains to be seen. I can think of few uses for it except point defense of installations and urban crowd control…
By: jonolan on February 10, 2009
at 1:55 am
no matter what, it’s for war use!
By: onerazan on February 10, 2009
at 2:42 am
onerazan,
Of course – it’s a weapon created for the military. What other purpose could it have? At least in America. Over here we don’t use our military as our police as well.
By: jonolan on February 10, 2009
at 7:19 am
perhaps this is a tool to minimize the number of innocent casualties of war. a breakthrough indeed, but it is really impossible to scare Muslim rebels with these. remember, they don’t mind taking the bullet for their religion, “a zap” is peanuts to them.
By: cherrylaurel on February 10, 2009
at 9:24 am
Cherry,
The ADS works by directing electromagnetic radiation, specifically, high-frequency microwave radiation at a frequency of 95 GHz[5] (a wavelength of 3.2 mm), toward the subjects.
This means it’s a microwave oven! You don’t have to scare off the jihadis. If they stick around, they’ll cook from the inside out. LOL
*smirk* The bonus – in the case of jihadis – is that cooking human flesh smells exactly like roast pork.
By: jonolan on February 10, 2009
at 3:55 pm
Hi Sir Jonolan,
are you from the military?
roast pork … hmmm … i hope with rosemary (LOL)
By: cherrylaurel on February 10, 2009
at 5:43 pm
Nice!
By: padawan on February 10, 2009
at 8:36 pm
Yes, Cherrylaurel, I was in the US military.
By: jonolan on February 11, 2009
at 1:13 am
But nevertheless… it is pretty awesome. Well, actually extremely awesome, imagine if they could hone this power into a hand held ray-gun.
By: marcus on March 12, 2009
at 8:16 am
It’s mostly a power supply issue. If we could generate enough power for weapon like this in a man-portable size, we wouldn’t need the weapon in the 1st place. We could pretty much by the world from the proceeds of that innovation.
By: jonolan on March 12, 2009
at 1:56 pm
that is a one awkward-looking weapon to me lol! for obvious reason, it can’t be used when there’s strong winds blowing. also with that large dish on top it is an easy target for enemy fire. at least they should have camouflaged it too.
this looks like one of those prism tanks (tanks that shoots light beams, burns any target to cinders) from the good old red alert 2 game…so if it is possible for microwaves to be utilized as a weapon to this degree then prism tanks is also doable. now that is what we call new/futuristic technology.
By: marl on April 1, 2009
at 7:32 am
marl,
I think that it’s only meant for urban riot control and base defense. It’s non-lethal so would serve well in those capacities, but doesn’t seem useful for the battlefield.
By: jonolan on April 3, 2009
at 12:47 am