Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

I'm a little confused about what you're trying to say.

Light googling indicates that this is an extant system that has been fitted to aircraft since 2009:

"DARPA, working in partnership with the Army Night Vision and Electronic Sensors Directorate, Air Force, Air Force Research Laboratory and National Geospatial Agency, conducted its first test flights using the ARGUS system last year [2009]."

The DoD indicates that the system was operationally deployed to Afghanistan in Q1 2011. [0]

LLNL has an article describing the system's optics, technical specs, and their work on processing the data streams it generates. [1]

BAE released an IR upgrade in 2010:

"BAE System's first flight tests of ARGUS-IR's predecessor, ARGUS-IS, concluded last October aboard a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter." [2]

[0] http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=62138

[1] https://str.llnl.gov/AprMay11/vaidya.html

[2] http://www.baesystems.com/article/BAES_028152/bae-systems-wi...?




Thanks for the added info. I didn't do any googling; I limited my commentary to the source you provided (I didn't look at the youtube video, that method usually carries a low signal to noise ratio). The wikipedia article is light on actual information about the ARGUS IS; the primary source is an article with the title "drone nightmare" in it. Other advertised capabilities don't exist yet. I will add your sources to the wikipedia article, they are much better than what is there.

I don't think that it should be expected that I exhaustively comb search engines to find support for your point; I think that it's reasonable that I look solely at the source you gave me.

That said, I found the capabilities in your first (0th) source to be chilling. That source definitely supports your point.




Consider applying for YC's Spring batch! Applications are open till Feb 11.

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: