How come we don't have snipping drones?

[Newell Steamer]

The drones can't have anything on them that will take up space they can use instead to store our stolen freedom,...

:*-(

 

[02ranger]

"Snipping drones?"

Castration from above?

They've already started a PR campaign.

lol i see these everyday on the way to work or driving in Denver

 

[Carson Dyle]

Dunno about sniping... that would take some technology to put a gun with remotely viewable sites on a consumer drone. It could certainly be done, but it would take some work.

I was wondering, though, about a simple bomb. Forget about carrying a backpack into a crowd and detonating it remotely. Just fly a drone in. Or imagine someone who's the object of a police standoff hovering a drone with a bomb above the command post two blocks away and ... boom.

 

[unokitty]

Dunno about sniping... that would take some technology to put a gun with remotely viewable sites on a consumer drone. It could certainly be done, but it would take some work.

I was wondering, though, about a simple bomb. Forget about carrying a backpack into a crowd and detonating it remotely. Just fly a drone in. Or imagine someone who's the object of a police standoff hovering a drone with a bomb above the command post two blocks away and ... boom.

Poor man’s cruise missile: silent, low-flying, low-signature “suicide” drones

As a poor man’s cruise missile, silent, low-flying, low-signature “suicide” drones will be difficult to detect and intercept using air defense systems such as the U.S.-made Patriot that is used by countries worldwide. There’s nothing overly high-tech or even strikingly innovative about this new development, as North Korea’s alleged tinkering with the Streaker makes it clear. And that’s ultimately what is most worrying about kamikaze drones: Their low cost, low-tech requirements, and “permissibility” following their adoption by global military forces, risks inviting their widespread use.

Two year old article. Suspect that cost, rather than technology, is what is holding back a wider adoption...

Uno

 

[Carson Dyle]

Two year old article. Suspect that cost, rather than technology, is what is holding back a wider adoption...

I'm not talking about a polished, military drone. I'm talking about a consumer quadcopter with a pound or so of high explosives, buzzing in on a crowd in a park, or visiting the local police. What are they going to do? Shoot it out of the sky with their sidearms?

 

[Pulsar]

I'm not talking about a polished, military drone. I'm talking about a consumer quadcopter with a pound or so of high explosives, buzzing in on a crowd in a park, or visiting the local police. What are they going to do? Shoot it out of the sky with their sidearms?

Imagine the havoc 10 or 15 of those could cause in an open-air NFL stadium packed for a football game.

 

[Ruptga]

I'm not talking about a polished, military drone. I'm talking about a consumer quadcopter with a pound or so of high explosives, buzzing in on a crowd in a park, or visiting the local police. What are they going to do? Shoot it out of the sky with their sidearms?

Definitely feasible, but not as easy as you might think. Lifting a few grenades' worth of mass isn't real hard, but controlling it well enough to hit a target, particularly when it's flying 30m in the air over and around obstacles, is an entirely different task. When it comes down to it, I think most nuts would be more prone to take the same few grenades' worth of explosives and bury them in a road or a mailbox; it's much easier to execute, much easier to get away with, and the potential damage inflicted is about the same.

Oooh I hadn't thought about model rockets, but that would work too. If you have a nearby hobby lobby you're already halfway to your own miniature V1 or V2 program.

 

[mikeford]

A basic rocket is MUCH simpler, put in a nasty low weight payload, fire out the back of a minivan a mile or two away.

We live in a world where safety isn't possible, so the focus needs to be on not creating nuts and detecting nuts prior to them doing the nut thing.

What should be "fun" will be the cheap anti drone drones, or Chinese clone of the Stinger with a $299 price tag. Small cheap SAM pods that are controlled via cell phone.

 

[Jeff7]

We're all laughing, but imagine for a moment a quad-copter with a pair of surgical scissors coming straight at your balls. I wouldn't want to be on the wrong end of that.

With sharpened rotors blades too, just in case.

Definitely feasible, but not as easy as you might think. Lifting a few grenades' worth of mass isn't real hard, but controlling it well enough to hit a target, particularly when it's flying 30m in the air over and around obstacles, is an entirely different task. When it comes down to it, I think most nuts would be more prone to take the same few grenades' worth of explosives and bury them in a road or a mailbox; it's much easier to execute, much easier to get away with, and the potential damage inflicted is about the same.

Oooh I hadn't thought about model rockets, but that would work too. If you have a nearby hobby lobby you're already halfway to your own miniature V1 or V2 program.

Nothing a good old-fashioned Zerg-rush couldn't fix.


And work with these people on the navigation aspect.
Coordinated Zerg-rush.
Heavy ordinance package.

 

[moonbogg]

I think it could work really well, insanely well actually. Precision .50 cal or 338 Lapua rifle unit, with one of those fancy new computerized targeting systems but modified to work well on the drone via remote control. The unit could have thermal imaging and armored piercing rounds to target and hit people inside of houses and buildings from the drones stable, hovering platform that it would provide.
Better yet, just go with a precision, highly accurate 30mm. It would be like a high precision apache helicopter gun. That would really do the job at about a mile range I think.
Or just use an apache helicopter to go in and thrash everything. Whichever.

 

[Ruptga]

I think some of those videos made it to the Hume thread as gifs a while back. That's all legitimately interesting, but it's research being carried out by universities. Maybe in the near future such technology will be available to village idiots and disenfranchised youth, but until then I'd hold off on ordering that CIWS system.

:hmm: Actually that could be very useful for keeping squirrels off the roof so I may need to rethink that, but not because I'm concerned about attack drones.

 

[Phoenix86]

I think some of those videos made it to the Hume thread as gifs a while back. That's all legitimately interesting, but it's research being carried out by universities. Maybe in the near future such technology will be available to village idiots and disenfranchised youth, but until then I'd hold off on ordering that CIWS system.

:hmm: Actually that could be very useful for keeping squirrels off the roof so I may need to rethink that, but not because I'm concerned about attack drones.

We're pretty close today with commercial, off the shelf tech.

 

[Jeff7]

I think some of those videos made it to the Hume thread as gifs a while back. That's all legitimately interesting, but it's research being carried out by universities. Maybe in the near future such technology will be available to village idiots and disenfranchised youth, but until then I'd hold off on ordering that CIWS system.

:hmm: Actually that could be very useful for keeping squirrels off the roof so I may need to rethink that, but not because I'm concerned about attack drones.

We're pretty close today with commercial, off the shelf tech.

Surveyor robot, with stereoscopic vision and built-in pathfinding.
It uses parts you could buy at Digikey, though you'd need a circuitboard made, and the programming. Still, nothing severely high-tech there.

A Kinect sensor also offers a lot of visual-processing horsepower in a small, though heavy, package.

Or build your own. Electrical engineer not included.



As for the squirrels on the roof, this laser wouldn't vaporize them, but it would discourage them.
To permanently deal with the problem, the Paladin Advanced 355-24000 should be up to the task.