Posted on 01/26/2006 12:16:01 PM PST by billorites
Over the past few years, products began to appear, that were capable of detecting divers approaching ships or waterside facilities. Now there are underwater weapons that can disable the swimmers.
One of the more recent of the detection systems is the Cerberus360 swimmer detection system. This is a (large) refrigerator size device that is lowered to the ocean floor in the middle of the area you want to guard. Cerberus360 uses sonar to detect anything, large enough to be a threat, up to 800 meters out. Actually, during tests, it was able to detect an approaching underwater scuba swimmer at 900 meters. Cerberus360 works well in shallow water, and can be tweaked by the operator, once emplaced, to be even more accurate.
Al Qaeda groups are know to have bought scuba gear and trained for attacks like this, but none have been attempted yet. But last year, Raytheon Corporation got a patent for a sonar type device that can disable divers as well. The Raytheon "swimmer denial" uses sound waves that are tuned to cause severe gastric distress in humans. Makes you heave into your scuba mask. This makes further underwater operations difficult, if not impossible. However, Raytheon has not announced any timetable for the delivery of these systems. There may not be a large enough market to justify it. For all the talk about scuba equipped terrorists, there have been very few cases of this sort of thing actually happening. Most have been off Israel, where the Israelis have been able to deal with the problem without using an acoustic swimmer denial system.
Mysterious dolphin barfing, maybe.
More like a HEEEEEAAAAAAAVVVVVEEEEEE ho'.
If I put that picture on the door of my frig, I might be able to loose that extra weight I put on during Christmas.
I think my High School lunch room was a secret beta test site for a device like this.
Can we get one of these for the Senate?
Kerry, Hitlery, et al, ad nauseum will soon be voting on Alito.
Dang it, dirt, you just curdled the milk on my buddy's desk.
I remember seeing a show a few years ago about "alternative weapons" for riot control. There was one being tested which would blast low level sound waves into a crowd which would make them spew AND crap their pants. I'm sure the rioters, in turn, would sue the police for public humiliation if this was ever used.
Well, I grant the seeming effectiveness of this acoustic system, but one can't deny the panache of Naval attack mammals:
http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/force_protection.html
My cats use vomit as a weapon against me all the time...
I'm not sure that's true. I've thrown up at 110 feet without any real consequence. And, BTW, I wasn't throwing up into my mask because it covered only my nose and eyes, not my mouth. I even felt better afterward, and, gross as it was, the fish around me didn't miss the opportunity for a meal either.
Sorry in advance.........
http://media.putfile.com/familyguypuke65
Thank God, Raytheon survived the Democrat attacks of the 70s and 80s. Halliburton is the new Raytheon.
Deb, I like your tag line...are you a perv like me...
Helen Thomas: The face that sank a thousand ships.
Maybe it's different for different people then. I absolutely rely on getting a gasp of breath between, uh, 'periods of distress'. Perhaps it has to do with the intensity of the event.
I am always fire-engine red for a few days afterwards- with a face full of burst capillaries.
Hand grenade. Works well, and is fairly inexpensive.
Still, the Raytheon system might have it's uses. It might be cheaper after the initial cost. You could leave it on 24/7. Blue on blue wouldn't be nearly as serious if someone fell over the side or the deck watch not getting the word about divers working below.
True. Rolling depth charges when in port would damage hulls though. There's a reason that Destroyers are hauling ass when they drop a pattern. Hand grenades going off in the water would be *brutal* on the eardrums and possibly also the sinuses.
Mythbusters pretty much busted the myth of a sound that could make you crap your pants. But it seems that the same test they did would have also disproved this theory, because their test subjects didn't get sick either.
But maybe they didn't ask Rather for the secret frequency.
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