Credo
"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." -- John Paul Jones
"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Caesar and Cleopatra"
"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friedrich Nietzsche
"A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty, are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancour, produces an indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate."--Edmund Burke
“You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.”--General Sir Charles Napier
"Μολὼν λαβέ" -- Leonidas
"Blogito Ergo Sum" -- Neptunus Lex
…and Seattle year-round?
Details…details…details…
bet it takes eleventy billion dollars to make that observation.
To my knowledge, we don’t have that wiz-bang flying over Baghdad yet. Sounds pork-a-licious to me.
With the right gear, that could mean a good, high res LIDAR over cities. Great for traffic enforcement.
We just need to put F-22s over all our major cities. It knows when you’ve been good or bad…
Actually DHS is testing laser based self protection systems on some aircraft, including some FedX jets.
They seem to work wel, though expensive.
Biggest issue I have with the concept of the UAV is timelines and getting energy into the seekers from off-axis. The latter would be a big issue in my view.
Well there are several types of lasers many do not work under 3,000 feet well, so if this system uses Argon Laser for instance it could hit certain targets at certain altitudes and if it uses something else and was that high Flight Level 60 then it could not. So, it would not be too much of a problem or help much with ground targets, but it would be very wise for air-targets.
Now then, if it had capability of decending below 3,000 feet or the elevation was higher than 3000 AGL then it could do both ground and air targets from 60,000 ft. It’s a good idea really and if it were a dirigible, it could stay up there for years and some of the gas in the blimp could be used for keeping it aloft, thus it would be pretty safe, and at that altitude no airliners (currently) would run into it.
I think the idea is worthy actually.
It’s not so much the lasers – although the way I understand it, they have trouble punching through clouds – but the targeting system will definitely have a problem looking through the inevitable undercast to see an IR missile launch.
Fair weather friends.
MANPADS vs. big multi-engines are over-rated.
2 engine DHL cargo bird out of Iraq- survived
C-17 out of Iraq- survived
C-5 out of Iraq- survived
Yeah they are dangerous. And I would worry more about smaller aircraft.
ELP- I have the powerpoint from DHL about that flight. Used it as a case study in aircraft stability and control, then again in stealth and survivability. They survived that hit and flew admirably. . .but I wouldn’t count on that kind of resolution every time.
Quick question(s) (I’m OUTCONUS and Japanese keyboards are immensely difficult to type on, I’ve no idea how Skippy does it) for everyone:
Given that:
1. The system would have a prolonged dwell at FL600 (I’m imagining some manner of tether).
2. You would need to confuse and blind a MANPAD sensor at close to ground level almost immediately after launch.
Question:
1. Blindness? Not on the part of the missile sensor, but if you’re doing what you’re (please forgive me for being intentionally vague and then getting myself into some sort of trouble) doing at that power level, you’re going to blind some poor schmoe on the ground.
2. What happens when the mooring line parts? (I’d like to refer everyone to the scene in ‘Hope and Glory’ where the blitz baloon breaks loose.)
3. FAR Part 91 students on solo, anyone?
3.a. Light civil folks not paying attention to detail? (I remember a conversation between LAX Approach and a rather lost Cessna 172 who, after some prompting “acknowledged” that he was IFR certified and knew better than to be in that area at that time.)
By the way: I understand that there are government foax that read this here discourse. If you’re in the mood for spendin’ some dough and don’t know what type of target to throw it at, I sure could use a Mamiya 645ZD and some decent glass for said. I’ll take purty pictures with it and everything. Maybe send you some. I’d need a paltry $40,000 (USD) to pay for the works. E-mail me and I’ll tell you where to send the cashier’s (no personal, no credit, cash is okay, Euros or Yen preferred,) check.
When using a Japanese key board just remember that many of the shift key functions are different. So long as Romanji is selected its not too hard.
It’ll never work. Everyone knows that the spate of recent tornado activity and resulting cloud cover are all George W. Bush’s fault. If he had signed the Kyoto treaty then global warming would be on the retreat and we would all be enjoying clean, cloud-free skies.