
Amphibious Warship USS Portland Shot Down a Drone with Its New High-Power Laser - smacktoward
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/33634/the-amphibious-warship-uss-portland-has-shot-down-a-drone-with-its-new-high-power-laser
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trynewideas
all sorts of Project Crossbow news these last couple of months. after what
happened with Hathaway at Pac Tech back in the 80s I thought it'd never come
around

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uj8efdkjfdshf
Is that a Real Genius (movie) reference?

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Genius](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Genius)

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PoachedSausage
Always, er never, forget to check your references.

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Jemm
The military meaning of amphibious warship is a bit disappointing.

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wolf550e
It deploys a battalion of marines in an amphibious landing, it does not itself
move on land.

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aaron695
Last time Star Wars was a lie, so I'd like to know exactly what has happened
this time around, is it in even close to a usable weapon in the field.

[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/reagans-great-
lie-i...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/reagans-great-lie-in-the-
sky-star-wars-scientists-may-have-deceived-moscow-and-congress-about-
the-1463972.html)

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yellowapple
I'd imagine "40 years of laser research" is exactly what has happened this
time around.

You can already buy lasers off Amazon or Aliexpress that can set things on
fire. I'm giving it 10 years tops before we have lethal man-portable laser
rifles.

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econcon
You can measure width of a hair using laser pointer:
[https://youtu.be/kpsN78mQ6YY](https://youtu.be/kpsN78mQ6YY)

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ChuckMcM
It always amazes me that the upper limit on these things is to avoid killing
satellites.

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winrid
Getting pretty close to the end of this tech tree. :)

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renw0rp
What happens if the beam his a person (for example on a boat)? I hope it's not
a very painful death.

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MaxLeiter
According to a professor at University of Texas, "It would take about a 1kW
laser to boil through someone’s eye to their brain in a reasonable amount of
time." This laser is 150-kilowatts.

src: [https://gizmodo.com/how-many-laser-pointers-would-it-take-
to...](https://gizmodo.com/how-many-laser-pointers-would-it-take-to-kill-a-
human-1728253506)

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scrumbledober
So it would be not good for a person to be hit by this laser. Got it.

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valuearb
I wonder how long it takes between rounds to recharge the system?

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xeromal
I wonder if the ship is nuclear powered and if that has any bearing on whether
it can support a laser or not.

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wolf550e
The only surface ships the US has that are nuclear powered are the
supercarriers. Nuclear ships are expensive.

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xeromal
Ah, that's what I was thinking of. Makes sense. That and some submarines
right?

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MeanWeen
All of the submarines to my knowledge, yes.

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valuearb
We need to start replacing our nuclear attack subs with AIP subs like Swedens.
Way cheaper, and stealthier.

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Udik
Next: drones that can detect a laser source and point a mirror back to it.

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nradov
Mirrors are not an effective defense.

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mcphage
Why not?

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econcon
Mostly because mirrors aren't perfect.

Let's say if a mirror can reflect 99% of the light that hits it, and we shot
it with 1kw laser. That means 100w is still heating the mirror and it might
melt or shatter it.

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rad_gruchalski
No. It’s 10W. Not 100W.

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econcon
Ofc, it's just an example. I realized later I made mistake, till then edit
window was gone.

