Barf Light Weapon
August 6th, 2007Via: Fox News:
It looks like a big flashlight — but it’s really a nonlethal weapon designed to make you sick.
Intelligent Optical Systems, Inc., of Torrance, Calif., has been granted a contract by the Department of Homeland Security to develop what it calls the “LED Incapacitator,” according to a DHS online newsletter.
The handheld device using light-emitting diodes to emit super-bright pulses of light at rapidly changing wavelengths, causing disorientation, nausea and even vomiting in whomever it’s pointed at.
“There’s one wavelength that gets everybody,” says IOS President Bob Lieberman. “Vlad [IOS top scientist Vladimir Rubtsov] calls it ‘the evil color.'”
Phase 1 of the contract — creating a working prototype — has already been completed, and Phase 2 will begin this fall as researchers at Penn State’s Institute of Nonlethal Defense Technology put the puke-saber through its paces.
“Phase 3 will be our shrink phase,” Lieberman said, admitting that the prototype, 15 inches long with a 4-inch lens, is too large and heavy to be comfortably carried on a belt.
DHS hopes to equip police, Border Patrol agents and National Guardsmen with the barf-beamers by 2010.
A few billion of our dollars later, the police get a nice new toy to harass us with.
Which hardly seems necessary. They already get away with murder . . . even on camera.
re: “the evil color.”
That sounds akin to South Park’s “the brown note.”
And some monochromatic goggles would easiy negate this, no?
Just sayin’
:o)
I assume everyone has seen Minority Report?
why not just create a pair of goggles or glasses to filter the particular wavelength(s)? i’m sure the necessary info will be published as a part of the patent process.
I guess the cops have never thought of the suspect puking all over them or the mess that is left behind that some poor cleaner will have to mop up.
I watched that video pragmatist, the video itself isn’t the amazing part, though a clearer video of an outright murder is not often seen. What’s amazing is that this cop murdered someone on camera and lied about it, then had everyone up the chain of command, through the DA and city officials, lie about it to cover for him –and then they promoted him. And they are so confident that they can get away with ANYTHING, including murder, that they didn’t even bother to destroy the evidence. So much for the silly notion that we live under the rule of law.
If there’s an evil color(s), why didn’t some animal evolve it as a defense mechanism?
Most weapons aren’t amenable to biological construction, but it sure seems like some eel or firefly species would have figured this one out by now. Maybe it takes loads of power.
I think a nice pair of highly reflective glasses or a pocket mirror might come in handy.
This works off the same principal that causes people to have seizures when exposed to certain patterns of flashing lights, but that’s not the point. The point is, I am SO getting one of these! Imagine the (virtually) harmless evil you could perpetrate with a barf light! You could adapt it to cover a large area to create a “party’s over” light, you could take it spelunking and have the cave to yourself, you could replace your friend’s flashlight secretly, then flip the breaker, you could cheat at a drinking contest and, when you’re really old and bored, you could MAKE the kids stay off your lawn! The thousands of possible uses for a barf ray strike me as unendingly amusing.