This is one of the larger versions that they’ve created to date, measuring 5 feet 7 inches across and weighing 170 pounds. The project was funded by the US Navy, presumably because the military has some interest in using this technology for surveillance or other purposes, but the researchers see how this could be used effectively for ocean monitoring or the cleaning up of oil spills. An earlier version, called RoboJelly, was about the size of a human hand.

The Cyro robot itself has eight mechanical arms extending from its central water-sealed brain and then a silicone skin is laid on top of that. The movement of the Cyro is similar to that of a jellyfish, which is incredibly efficient. They hope that as they improve the design, the Cyro will be able to head out on its own for months at a time. Indeed, the larger the model, the longer the range it could have.

Check out the demo video below, which includes an interview with VT College of Engineering graduate student Alex Villanueva.

[Source]

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The idea behind this tiny remote-controlled craft, as designed by aerospace engineer Larry Friese, is similar to what we see with hovercraft or with the “air boats” that are used to transverse certain waters in the southern United States. Instead of having part of the boat below the surface of the water and having a propeller spin away to push you forward, you have an airplane-style propeller above the water that effectively pushes the air and thrusts your craft forward. Meanwhile, the entirety of your waterbound vehicle stays above the surface of the water.

The FrankenDrone USV works in much the same way. It has that propeller out the back and then its flotation pontoons sit on the surface of the water, allowing it to skim across even the shallowest of ponds. Steering is done by swiveling the propeller to either side. The USV could then be used for any number of purposes, attaching cameras, microphones, lights or whatever else.

The project is currently seeking funding via Kickstarter with a goal of $25,000. Check out the video to see the FrankenDrone in action.

[Source]

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Designed by Prox Dynamics of Norway, the Black Hornet is four inches long, one inch tall, and weighs 16 grams. There’s a tiny camera mounted on board that can send pictures and videos back to a handheld receiver up to a kilometre away, allowing soldiers to gain information about an area without having to directly risk the lives and safety of soldiers that would otherwise be tasked with that mission.

It helps that the Black Hornet is incredibly tiny and flies nearly silently, navigating its way around buildings to see if there is any danger. It can only fly at a maximum of 10 meters per second and the battery pack only lasts about 25 minutes, but that should be enough for some basic recon. It can act as an R/C helicopter or it can act as an autonomous drone based on GPS.

Yes, it’s expensive, but that’s military-spec tech for you. It’s ruggedized to handle the harsh conditions of the battlefield, including extreme heat and wind. The UK Military of Defense has placed an order for 160 units, totalling 20 million GBP. That works out to about $31.3 million or about $195,000 each.

[Source]

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Former US Navy lieutenant Christopher Dorner was fired from the LAPD in 2008 for lying about a fellow officer accused of misconduct and he is now seeking revenge by “killing officers and their families,” according to his Facebook page. He has already shot and killed the daughter of a former LAPD captain, as well as her fiance. He was also involved in a shootout with police shortly thereafter, wounding one of the officers at the site.

Dorner is now thought to be hiding out in the San Bernardino mountains near Los Angeles as the plans to “utilize every bit of small arms training, demolition, ordinance and survival training” he’s been given as he prepares to “bring warfare” to the LAPD. As a result, a task force of 125 officers are continuing their search for Dorner in the mountains, but they realize that searching on the ground is “like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

The drone or drones being used don’t appear to be carrying any lethal weaponry. Instead, they have thermal imaging cameras that the task force hopes will be able to locate Dorner in the snow-capped mountains. Dorner is now the first human target for a remote-controlled UAV on US soil, at least officially. Does this create for a slippery slope for future, potentially dangerous situations? Dorner says that he is prepared to use a shoulder-mounted surface-to-air missile to “knock out” any helicopters to pursue him, so in the interest of protecting the officers in this chase, perhaps the drone is the safest option?

[Source]

The post Drones Used to Hunt Man on US Soil for the First Time appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

We’re in the middle of another huge revolution when it comes to warfare and it has to do with the increased use of robots and unmanned drones. Instead of sending the actual soldier into the line of fire, you send a bot to do the job and, to some extent, you give the bot the autonomy to make its own decisions. That’s good and bad, depending on your perspective.

Embedded below is a fascinating documentary on how military drones are changing war, narrated by Josh Rushing. He is a 14-year veteran of the US Marines and is currently a journalist. Your propaganda alarms should be on alert, as with any of these kinds of programs with a clear agenda, but it’s fascinating to watch nonetheless and well worth the 24 minutes of your time. Is Skynet really right around the corner?

The post Fault Lines: Rise of the Machines in War (Video) appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

If the eye3 gets the $25,000 of funding that it needs, it can ship out to average Joes like you and me for all of our awesome imaging needs. It ships as a kit, so you will need to put it together, but all the hard work with testing and design has been done for you. Pledge $999 or more and you get an eye3 hexacopter kit of your own!  Check out the Kickstarter page for more information and to back the project.

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It makes sense that the military wants to have eyes in the sky for surveillance, but when you’re that far away from your target, it can be pretty tough to really see what you want to see. You need more pixels, gigapixels perhaps, and in the case of the US Army, they’ve opted for 1.8 of them.

The A160 Hummingbird was recently unveiled with a new imaging system. Remember that 1.8 gigapixels is 100x more detail than what you’d get with your 18MP digital camera, and it’s usually only with multiple shots that we regular folk can stitch together a gigapixel photo. The kicker is that this hovering aircraft can send back real-time video streams at 10 frames a second too.

When hovering at an altitude of 20,000 feet, the camera has a field of view of almost 65 square miles. The army can then simultaneously track up to 65 targets within this field of view without having to decide which target is the priority. “If you have a bunch of people leaving a place at the same time, they no longer have to say, ‘Do I follow vehicle one, two, three or four,’” said program manager Brian Leninger. “They can say: ‘I will follow all of them, simultaneously and automatically.’”

The drones use the Autonomous Real-time Ground Ubiquitous Surveillance Imaging System (ARGUS-IS) first deployed last year. The first generation drones were manufactured by Boeing, but the military is holding a “full and open” competition for the second generation contract.

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I really like R/C helicopters from a hobbyist’s perspective, but you can see how useful they’d be for more practical purposes too. Drones are used all the time in a military context and now one sheriff’s office in Texas is getting its own drone copter, complete with the ability to get weaponized.

The Shadowhawk helicopter has been acquired by the Sheriff’s office in Montgomery County in Texas. They say that it is being used as a safety asset, equipped with a remote video camera, infrared heat-seeking, and onboard GPS. It can be used to monitor situations where a human presence might not be the best idea.

The 50-pound UAV is built by Vanguard Defense Industries and while it is capable of carrying weapons, the Sheriff says that they have no plans to equip it with pellet guns, bean bags, or frickin’ laser beams tasers. Instead, the application is more toward tracking down criminals or assisting SWAT teams. What do you think of the concerns in relation to Big Brother-esque ramifications?

Check out the local news coverage for a video.

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They, however, believe it’s a virus of the type that steals log-in and password data from people who gamble online or play games like Mafia Wars. But really, the Pentagon is showing reluctance in talking about any computer security breach at all, and this virus infection isn’t any different. They have been known to consider common clean-up of worm invasions as classified missions and give them according names like “Operation Buckshot Yankee”.

Unlike other times when the situation has been hushed, the drone virus has received so much publicity that the military could not keep a lid on it any longer. So they what they do is release a press release in which they call the infection “more of a nuisance than an operational threat”.

It is believed that the virus got spread by portable hard drives that they use to transfer data with, but that’s not the only angle they’re approaching, refusing to say which other ways the virus could have gotten in the system. Which inevitably would have come from a human.

The post U.S. Military Drones Infected With Virus, Source Unknown appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

The Navy is still confused about the situation, not knowing what caused the disconnect, and why the drone did not return. Commander Danny Hernandez, a Navy spokesman, told the NYT “When they lose contact with the Fire Scout, there’s a program that’s supposed to have it immediately return to the airfield to land safely. That did not happen as planned.”

As a result, all 6 Fire Scout drones have been grounded. The Navy did eventually regain control of the drone somewhere in D.C. half-hour and 23 miles later, but that’s enough to take a serious look at the so called “software glitch” that caused it. Let’s just hope these things aren’t carrying live ammunition.

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