(Navy) Laser system goes 2-for-2 in key test

[unhappycamper]

The Laser Weapons System tracked and killed targets in a test-firing May 24 at San Nicholas Island, Calif.


Laser system goes 2-for-2 in key test
By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Jun 5, 2010 9:53:57 EDT

One of the Navy’s first laser weapons got a step closer to the fleet’s arsenal in late May when engineers proved it could find, track and zap targets over the ocean in a test firing off the West Coast.

Dubbed the Laser Weapons System, or LaWS, the weapon destroyed two drones in what sailors would know as a detect-to-engage exercise, partly using familiar sensors already on scores of ships in the fleet as part of their Phalanx Close-In Weapons Systems. Navy engineers hope LaWS will join CIWS on ships in the next six or seven years to become the new go-to safeguard against fast, dangerous anti-ship missiles.

“We’re not interested in destroying Death Stars or anything like that yet,” said Dennis Tressler, Naval Sea Systems Command’s deputy program manager for energy weapons. Still, a laser CIWS would give a ship more accuracy and a theoretically infinite magazine, compared with the smothering but still limited ordnance of today’s Gatling gun version.

LaWS, which was on land, zapped both drones May 24 in a test at San Nicholas Island, Calif. — its first firing over the ocean. In a test last year, the laser destroyed all five unmanned targets at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., but that was in a clear, dry desert environment. Moisture in the atmosphere can disrupt directed energy weapons, which is a central challenge in fielding them aboard ships, Tressler said.

Engineers and weapons planners have dreamed for decades about the benefits of lasers — weapons that theoretically can kill targets at almost the speed of light, never run out of ammunition and cost “pennies per shot” — taking the place of expensive surface-to-air missiles. And advocates say lasers’ potential goes beyond their immediate tactical value: If an enemy knows a warship can just vaporize incoming anti-ship missiles all day, for example, he might not bother to launch them.

[Ian David]

1. You'd need to find a VERY large frickin' shark if you wanted to attach one to its head. n/t

[MindPilot]

2. You know all the sharks you see now are just babies, right?

Adult sharks eat whales in a single bite and need oil in the water to breath.

[NYC_SKP]

3. The perfect defense: A very large one of these:

A laser reflecting prism, used in surveying.

I own one, just cuz it's cool.



Actually, I just have the prism.

Three inches in diameter, it's designed to take an incoming beam of light and reflect it back precisely to the light source.

If you close one eye and look into it, you see a mirror image and the pupil of your open eye is dead center in the reflection in the optic.

In this image, you can make out the digital camera and fingers holding it, and the center of camera lens reflected dead center.



http://www.budgetcom.nl/components-optical/reflector-mirror-prisma/prod_24.html

:hi:

[TheMadMonk]

5. Rather eerie the first time you encounter one in the street.

The same multiple reflection effect is why you always get a facefull of water when you spray a hose into a corner.

[NYC_SKP]

8. That's a perfect analogy!

And utterly consistent to the shape of the thing.

I went and found mine and that is exactly how the prism is cut; three surfaces coming together at right angles.

:hi:

[liberaltrucker]

7. Not detracting from it's coolness, but

it wouldn't reflect an IR laser, just those in optical
wavelengths. An educated guess-I could be wrong.

[Yeahyeah]

4. "pennies per shot".Very believable.How many pennies so far?

[MidwestTransplant]

9. After it's fired a trillion or so times.

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. What will sci fi writers use now?

Oh well.