US firm says handheld puke ray is ready to go A US industrial laser company says it has developed a functional puke-ray system, ideal for use by cops or military personnel wishing to take down their opponents without shooting them. The firm proposes to issue the "non lethal light fighting technology" in two form factors - light-sabre/torch and blaster-pistol. The so- …
Hmm, do you really think that a company making a product like this will not have thought about rotating the frequency upon which the puke ray is transmitted?
A more interesting question would be "what happens when the puke ray gets accidnetally reflected onto an innocent bystander?".
We already have Mr and Mrs Chav's young offspring shining green laser pens into the eyes of any random passing pilot or bus driver. Can't wait to see the effect when they're hanging from an overpass on the M1 blasting these at passing drivers. Lethal vs non-lethal is a matter of where you aim it.
I have the same problem with this that I do with tasers. Because it is non-lethal, it is presented to people as okay to use. It's just another means for people to physically hurt you with less consequence to themselves. "Pain compliance" as the police call it: hurt someone until they obey.
Paris, because I need someone to make me smile with stories like this.
1) These are going to end up in other people's hands, and then this will be fun, because we'll have people making others puke up from a mile away. There'll be no way to find out who it is.
2) Innocent bystanders? If this has to hit eyes, then it either has to be very accurate or have a wide dispersion field.
3) Sunglasses/spectacles/goggles? What do they do to this. If the glass in spectacles causes a refraction, is that going to seriously mess up this device, perhaps turning it into a blinding ray? My bet is research not done.
4) This will be a new (and quite untraceable since it leaves no output) way for the police to torture people. Anyone who thinks they won't use it to do that should read about the way the police act, in news stories for example.
If the device is anything like previous generations of dazzlers, they work upon green wavelengths (because human eyes are particularly perceptive to them) and probably of enough intensity that they can at least be noticeable even with eyelids shut (much like staring into the sun with eyes shut).
another long-distance intimidation tool, a non-lethal crowd control alternative in addition to all the others already out there. consider these implemented by the rozzers at your next 'peaceful' demonstation/riot, mixed with the standard mace, batons, tear gas, rubber bullets, water cannons, attack dogs, horses and maybe other future microwave/sonic/dizzy/burny/puke rays...
"There have been efforts to make dazzlers using lasers, but LEDs could be a safer choice. "Getting an eye-safe wavelength with a laser has been very difficult," Shwaery says. Because laser beams are energetic and focused, they could cause permanent damage to the eye."
http://tinyurl.com/39gzvp
This is the old vomit flashlight using lasers instead, hopefully without blinding some of the people.
are normally visible in daylight (far better than red ones used by police attached to MP5's).
Also, the military safety glasses (normal or rubber band style) are normally laser safe so would block this as well (laser's from red to blue use a wide frequency range and they are all blocked).
So, can't use it on a US military uprising then......
Speaking of uprising...
There's already a readily-adaptable countermeasure in existence. Welders have used auto-darkening hoods for ages, there's no reason why the technology can't be adapted for use in something the size of a pair of sunglasses. Hell, there's half the countermeasure you need to defeat a flashbang grenade. The other half? Headphones with microphones that cut out over a certain decibel range (these already exist and are used commonly for hunting).
If these things get made, they will primarily be used either by law enforcement to torture innocents, or by assholes who see that they are for sale to anyone, to torture innocents. Feh.
"Hmm, do you really think that a company making a product like this will not have thought about rotating the frequency upon which the puke ray is transmitted?"
Yes, I do. I think they made it work one way and didn't worry their pretty little heads about anyone who would work around it technically. This is in line with the folk who originally made wireless phones so you could listen to them using a shortwave radio, and made subway cards so you could add cash to or clone them fraudulently, and are making identity cards you can read from a dozen meters away using ordinary equipment.
"What happens if you run away? I.e. Turn your back to the beam?"
In this case, if you were a threat, you've just been controlled, and the device was successful.
From the article: "... the threats vision is temporarily impaired, their balance is effected, and they become affected by nausea..."
Apparently it also messes with your ability to manage the definitions of affect and effect, possibly leading to getting it right and wrong in two different instances of the same usage in a single sentence. Apostrophe loss is another reported side effect.
Paris, because she cures apostrophe loss, if you know what I mean.
Just like tasers, they're "non-lethal" until someone is attacked who suffers from some medical condition that causes them to die after repeated retching.
And just like tasers, just because it's described as "non-lethal" will mean it's not used in place of deadly force, as was the original intention. The weapons' use will be extended to other forms of control, more as a substitute for spanking than anything else, because the wielder of non-lethal force gets a kick out of watching people suffer.
We already know enough to build one, people.
You need:
1. a bright light source. It will look like a pinpoint, or torch lens at most. So yes, we could use green lasers, but ultra-bright green LEDs will work. Won't get the 2 mile range though.
2. probably a rolling series of frequencies to flicker the light over. Somewhere around the 50-60hz range, plus a few over/under tones. Basically the range that induces epilepsy. Or just project a frantic network game of Doom2 in 320x240 at them, that used to do it for me.
Soldering irons and PIC microcontrollers at the ready!
All this talk of lasers not being tunable is wrong. Argon ion lasers are tunable across a large part of the visible spectrum, we had one at uni, it was cool :)
Even less special lasers are tunable within certain limits, changing the tilt on the stepped grating at the back of a gas laser for instance.
If you want to go diode then I guess you could have a gattling arrangement of frequency shift crystals, though this may be too course.
As for "the military have glasses that are laser safe" that is a very subjective statement. Even glasses tuned to stop the wavelength of light I work with are no use if you cop it straight in the eye. If they could stop it then they'd be black and thick.
If you stop all the wavelengths then your glasses will be black.
I'm only trying to correct a few statements, don't think for one minute that I think this thing has a chance in hell of actually working. Reflective glasses, turning your back, or even trying to aim the damn thing across 2.4Km is going to be a show stopper.
By the way, I've managed to hit someone whilst being sick (there was beer involved:)
I suggest old kind of pedestrian reflectors, the kind thats made of prismed plastic. Reflects light straight back to light source.
I wonder how the police will be able to claim this causes no permanent harm from one corner of their mouth and scold kids with laserpointers for causing permaneent eye harm for the other corner? A new tongue twiter and scitchoprenia sympton of police force?
These guys can't tell the difference between movies and reality - like, they take Star Wars all too literally. Movie physics has, they'll be sorry to hear, movie countermeasures.
Certainly everyone remembers those really cool mirror sunglasses worn by (mostly Southern) motorcycle movie cops. Make them with flat lenses so to better aim the reflection back at the sender (maybe 90% reflectivity of all wavelengths and an off-wavelength filter to avoid the rest getting through).
Oh, hell, just keep a mirror in your pocket and cover your eyes with it on threat of being "dazzled" and dazzle the dazzler. Maybe a flip-down mirror on your ball cap visor - so retro, so reminiscent of your fav bass fisherman, so cheap, and causing all to wear their baseball hats forward again.
I can see the demonstrating hoi polloi, each equipped with a mirror, ready to do battle with the skull-busting jack-boots turned lightsaber-wielding Vader wannabes. ...and the streets ran green with puke.
Taser replacement? In their dreams.
And h4rm0ny and Rich - what's with your complaint with Tasers, given that the police already have firearms, batons and pepper spray each of which are far more deadly or painful and potentially more lethal than Tasers.
This might lead to less tragicomic cases of disproportionate tazer force.
Realistically though, it probably just means more inventive potential for sadistic cruelty in reponse to minor traffic violations.
Hey, maybe we can combine this with electric shock administration and intense epidermal pain-inducing microwaves to sort out the… ah… huge problem… of subjugating the man on the street?
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