Well, there was also some other details left out by that article. A "100kW beam" doesn't tell you very much if you don't know the beam diameter. A 1310nm telecom laser can cause serious eye damage with 10mW, but that's 10mW into, say 38 um^2. But it ain't going to do nothing to enemy aircraft located at a distance. A 100kW laser might easily have a smaller energy density depending on the diameter. In addition, there's the problem of focusing that thing through turbulence, but turbulence through certain wavelength windows may not be a problem.
>From: Steve Schear <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Subject: Re: US developing untraceable weapons >Date: Sat, 12 Oct 2002 17:28:03 -0700 > >At 12:10 PM 10/11/2002 -0700, "Major Variola (ret)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >>Theres no huge explosion associated with its employment, there are no >>pieces and >>parts left behind that someone can analyze to say, this came from the >>United States, >>explains an unnamed Lockheed Martin official quoted in Aviation Week and >>Space >>Technology in July. The damage is localized, and it is hard to tell >>where it came from >>and when it happened. It is all pretty mysterious. > >The only energy sources I can think of that is portable enough to go in a >jet are a generator running of the main/aux jet engine or a chemical >pumping. > >Unless the DoD has found a practical new chemical reaction, other than the >Fluorine/Deuterium they used for decades on various shipboard project such >as MIRACL, the plane would be easily identified and targeted by the >fluorescing the chemical plume with LIDAR. > >Assuming a laser efficiency of 5% an electric source would have to provide >over 2 MW of continuous power (from Star Wars test results, I assume a >pulsed laser is inadequate for causing damage in combat situations) to >supply a 100KW beam. The most efficient generators I'm aware are capable >of producing about 2-4 HP/lb. 2 MW equates to about 2700 HP or about 650 - >1300 lbs. Assuming the laser isn't too terribly heavy or aerodynamically >cumbersome the entire package could be carried aboard a fighter. > >steve > > >"War is just a racket ... something that is not what it seems to the >majority of people. Only a small group knows what its about. It is >conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses." >--- Major General Smedley Butler, 1933 _________________________________________________________________ Join the worlds largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com
