Anytime I hear that someone’s mounting an automated lazer system to zap things out of the sky I always get a little worried. The thought occurs, wrong though it may be, that an automated system fast enough to blast out things flying at the planes could either:
A) Be tampered with to blast the actual plane
or
B) Accidentaly decide the plane isn’t supposed to be in the sky and remedy the situation
Somehow I don’t think the makers of this beastie have a 100% answer on both of those. The first one is actually more of a concern, as I should hope they’d be able to distinguish between a plane and a small non-plane object at least.
Birds everywhere now feel less secure near runways, I’m sure. Although if the hit rates (20%?) are anything like the systems for shooting down large ballistic missles the .gov was looking at a few years back, the falcon’s won’t have much to fear.
Airport security: Now featuring lasers | News.blog | CNET News.com
