Drones with Frick’n Laser Beams Attached

The unfolding revolution wrought by unmanned aerial vehicles has freed a number of military missions from the tyranny of human endurance. Plinking terrorists no longer requires an aircraft with oxygen flowing into the cockpit, parachutes or other gear necessary to ensure a pilot’s survival.

But another limit still exists.

When MQ-1 Predators are armed, they head off into the wild blue yonder with a lone pair of Hellfire missiles under their wings. It’s a double-barreled shotgun you can’t reload.

But folks at General Atomics are getting increasingly excited by the HELLADS — the High Energy Liquid Laser Defense System. It is designed to shrink a flying laser into a package small enough to cram onto an aircraft.

“It would give us an unlimited magazine,” says one person close to the program. There’s talk that it could be fielded within five years.

In other words, an unmanned aircraft could not only give U.S. forces a so-called “persistent presence” overhead, it wouldn’t have to return to base after firing its pair of missiles for lack of additional firepower.

2012-12-10 21:23:05

Source: http://ausbullion.blogspot.com/2012/12/drones-with-frickn-laser-beams-attached.html