Apparently quite a few key observatories use lasers to adjust telescope optics for atmospheric turbulence. Those same lasers can damage Earth-observing satellites and so regulations on their usage have been getting stricter and stricter over the years. Now astronomers have had enough. They are happy to consult with the Air Force each time they point a laser at the sky to make sure that a satellite isn’t in the path, but it seems that the turnaround time is too long. I don’t see why they don’t just change it to a “We’ll have your analysis delivered in less than 30 minutes or you can point your lasers wherever you want” rule. [New Scientist]

The parked truck’s hood and engine gets burned through like butter, and as you can see, the accuracy is pretty amazing. The laser can produce between 100-300kW of power, and the obvious next step is to trial it on moving targets.

Even though the Air Force has scaled back the ambitious program’s funding, perhaps we may still see the laser make it to battlefields. Maybe on the 76m Long Hybrid Airship Will Spy Over Afghanistan Battlefields in 2011? [Boeing via PopSci]

Pew pew

Apparently the “pilots” of an unmanned, but armed, MQ-9 Reaper drone lost control of the UAV a few days ago. The resulting manned mission to take it down was mounted almost immediately and ended successfully before the drone reached Afghanistan’s airspace.

I wonder what would’ve happened if the Reaper hadn’t been shot down. It is typically used for “hunter-killer” missions and targets enemies on the ground. Would it continue a mission like that without operator input?

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles like the Reaper are supposed to be programmed to return to their home bases in case they lose contact with their “pilots”. There’s no explanation as to why the fail-safe didn’t kick in for this particular Reaper. Nor is this incident the first time that a UAV has been shot down by intentional friendly fire. What’s going on and when can I start to panic? [Aviation Weekly via Popular Science]

The Death and Taxes poster shows every single expense according to the president’s 2010 budget request. The circles you see here are proportional in size to their actual weight in the total budget. Each of the figures include the percentage change compared to 2009.

Defense spending is more or less the same, only increasing by 2%. And still, everything else looks minuscule.

USA Today says that the Advanced Tactical Laser was carried aboard a C-130 plane. Though the power level produced during the test wasn’t revealed, these lasers, Global Security says the Advanced Tactical Laser can produce between 100-300 kW of lethal or non-lethal power (in theory).

The Advanced Tactical Laser is said to improve accuracy of military attacks with less collateral damage, something the U.S. Military has drawn criticism for as of late. But you know that secretly, General Gates is even more excited by the idea of getting some pew pew action in real life. [USA Today]

We take these huge military aeroplanes for granted, but listening to an expert describing the technology—like titanium heat dissipators and thrust reverters mounted on top—is quite enlightening. Best thing, however: Furry pilot seats.

[The Dew Line]

When the U.S. Government Accountability Office released a report saying that worldwide GPS performance is likely to degrade in the next few years, lot of people, public and private, kinda flipped. Cue the inevitable about-face, right about…now.

The Air Force recently held a Twitter news conference to a—wait, what?

Force Space Command’s subject-matter-expert on the Global Positioning System (GPS) program will Twitter on the command’s site, www.twitter.com/AFSpace, in response to the recent Government Accountability Office report on the GPS program.

Apparently, the F-22 Raptor was only phased out to free up some funds to buy everyone Twitterific licenses. Anyway.

The conference was intended to assuage the people’s fears of haywire satnavs and inconsistence Loopt performance. This was apparent from the start:

The issue is under control. We are working hard to get out the word. The issue is not whether GPS will stop working. There’s only a small risk we will not continue to exceed our performance standard. Agree w/ GAO thr’s a potential risk, but GPS isn’t falling out of the sky—we have plans 2 mitigate risk & prevent a gap.

But that’s not terribly specific, and they more-or-less said that they agree with the previous report. Well, not totally:

We have 30+ satellites on orbit now. We’ll launch another in Aug 09, and again early 10. Going below 24 won’t happen.

Dropping below 24 satellites was the central concern of the initial report, and the subject of all its various probability calculations: when reporters talk about the 90% chance of GPS degradation by 2017, they were actually referring to the chances of the satellite constellation dipping below 24.

So the Air Force is pretty sure they can prevent that, now that they know. That’s reassuring, but also exactly what they kind of have to say, being that GPS is a critical tool not just for gadget enthusiasts, but for militaries and corporations around the world. [PC World via TechRadar]

What happens when you put a hacker in camouflage? He only grows more deadly.

The NYT published an interesting piece categorising the new role of cadets from West Point as digital information sabotage—scenarios like mailbombs flooding email servers in hot zones —becomes a worrisome daily hurdle in a war.

During a senior elective class at West Point, the cadets competed with the Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard and Merchant Marine to thwart attacks from the N.S.A. The students went so far as to hang a sign reading “Information Warfare Live Fire Range” outside their class.

In other words, military dudes can now pwn your arse in analogue and digital. [NYT]

Imagine this: You are Chinese MiG pilot chasing a Royal Australian Air Force F/A-18 fighter jet. All of the sudden, you see the flash of a fired missile under its wing, which leaves you scratching your head. After all, you are the one chasing the guy ahead and he doesn’t have anything in front. So for a brief moment you wonder until you see the missile turning around towards you, which is probably the last thing you are going to see in your life, seconds before getting engulfed in flames. Good bye, sucker.

That’s exactly what the Australians did the other day for the first time ever, without grilling a Chinese pilot: One of their new ASRAAM (Advanced Short-Range Air-to-Air Missile) was fired at a target behind the wing-line of one of their F/A-18 Hornets. The chasing plane was located at more than three miles behind the Hornet, resulting in a direct kill.

What does this mean? Basically, that you don’t need to be Maverick to survive up there as long as you have a full load of these missiles. According to the company, the new ASRAAMs give full-around protection. But then again, all these fighters are going to be irrelevant soon. [Defense Tech]