From: ChuckKuecker (ckuecker@mcs.net)
Date: Fri Jul 10 1998 - 07:17:48 MDT
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At 08:47 PM 7/9/98 EDT, EvMick wrote:
>
>My guess would be (given what little I know of present day tech)
that a
>portable laser might be used to ionize a pathway thru the air such
that it
>might conduct an electric current. Kind of a "cow prod at a
distance"...or a
>taser without the wires.
>
>A nonlethal device that no one would be seriously hurt with.
(absent the odd
>heart attack...but surely less lethal than airborne lead
poisoning)...but ever
>bit as much a deterrant as a firearm. BETTER than a fire arm
perhaps due to
>it's possible physical characterstics of no recoil...speed of light
execution
>(well...REAL fast anyway...faster than a bullet)...no "lead"
nesecarry...low
>(or no) noise...etc....etc.. Very little training would be needed.
>
>Or some other kind of a "stunner".
>
Possibly a shift in the thread..
A laser sufficiently powerful to ionize an air column strongly enough
to carry current sufficient to deter or injure a human would by
itself be a very dangerous or lethal weapon. Death ray, anyone?
The other business I am involved in seeks nonlethal solutions to
problems such as high speed car chases and similar situations where
the police now use guns or main force. One idea I had was a charged
stream of liquid to carry a current, a'la taser. I constructed a
prototype with two Super Soakers mounted on a common pistol grip, and
a 20 kV pulse generator connected so that the water streams would
complete a circuit on the target. Testing resulted in the conclusion
that a liquid stream cohesive enough to act at greater than three
feet range would in itself carry enough energy to be able to seriousl
injure the person aimed at. Also, simply wearing a raincoat renders
the gadget useless.
About this time I applied for a patent on the device on the chance it
could be somehow debugged - and found that another company had beaten
us to the punch. Their disclosure, unfortunately, missed all the
information my experiments turned up, so that their device is likely
also useless.
Other ideas could be use of phased sound - low frequencies have been
shown to disorient wihtout causing permanent harm, but are terribly
hard to project, and ultrasonics can cause discomfort, but the power
level needed is again possibly dangerous. There has been mention in
trade journals of an ultrsonic 'speaker' that can direct audio to an
apparent location in free space by using collimated ultrasonic beams
that have beat notes in the range of the desired frequency. The air
itself becomes the radiator.
Perhaps I have said too much...
Chuck Kuecker
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