Palmer Luckey's weapons company Anduril Industries announces a drone that rams into other drones

[Matrix]

 

 

 

Drones are one of the more exciting products in the tech market. They have quite a bit of potential to help advance the human race; across a wide variety of industries and use cases. Drones can (and already do) help creators make better video content, they can transport lightweight packages for business or medical purposes, and, perhaps most importantly, they're pretty fun to fly.

Though most of the uses we've listed so far are relatively innocuous, drones are obviously being deployed for militaristic purposes as well. Indeed, Oculus' co-founder Palmer Luckey's company, Anduril Industries, recently published a press release that announced a new type of autonomous, military defense-oriented drone. Unlike other combat drones, the "Interceptor" does not possess any actual weaponry of its own (for now).

A concept image of the "Interceptor" drone.

Instead, the Interceptor is the weapon. Whether through a manual cue or an AI-powered decision, the Interceptor possesses the ability to autonomously fly toward a hostile drone at high speeds (roughly 100mph) with the intent of ramming itself into the enemy device. Ideally, the hostile drone will be rendered ineffective on impact; if not outright destroyed.

According to Bloomberg, Anduril has already begun shipping these drones out to their military customers throughout the world; most notably in the US and the UK. So, if you're a consumer with a drone flying hobby, it may be wise to steer clear of military installations in the future (which, frankly, you should already be doing) -- unless you want to get your drone back in small pieces.

 

 VIEW: Original Article.

[Karlston]

Watch Anduril’s Anvil take down an off-the-shelf drone in midflight

Drone-on-drone violence

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This week, news broke of Palmer Luckey’s new battering-ram drone system, and today, the company finally released footage of the drone in action. The new footage shows Anduril’s system taking down both a fixed wing drone and an opposing quadcopter, which looks to be a knock-off of the DJI Phantom.

 

The drone (dubbed “Anvil”) is designed to take out enemies from below, with the battery and motors optimized for short, fast flights. It’s also designed to take the impact and survive: the rotors are on the bottom, and all of the flight-critical components are positioned as low as possible. So even if some of the more delicate equipment is damaged, the Anvil should be able to land in one piece.

 

None of this will do much to reassure concerns about Anduril’s border project, which many saw as a nightmare of Trump-era automated surveillance. But Anvil is designed for use by the military rather than border agencies, and it’s not clear if it would be much use at the border. Based on the vertical angle of attack — which is essential to the drone’s layout — it’s also hard to imagine the system being very effective against a human being.

 

Functionally, the biggest concern is that Anvil will sustain too much damage with each impact, making it too expensive to work as a long-term countermeasure. But rogue quadcopters are a newly plausible threat for the military, and there aren’t many solutions that don’t involve large-scale jamming emplacements. If Anvil can make a case that it’s the best option, it could make a lot more sense than the company’s border-vision plans.

 

Update 4:22PM ET: Updated with a more condensed version of the video.

 

 

Source: Watch Anduril’s Anvil take down an off-the-shelf drone in midflight  (The Verge)

[Arachnoid]

The Patriot missile with an explosive warhead failed more times than not to intercept an incoming device how this is any more efficient is unlikely.