Boeing 747 destroys ballistic missile with laser (update: photos!)
By Thomas Ricker 
posted February 12th 2010 6:19AM
posted February 12th 2010 6:19AM
No, this isn't a call to arms (yet), the US is simply evaluating its airborne laser weapon again. Now listen in because this latest test was a doozy. Last night at 8:44pm Cali time, the Airborne Laser Testbed (ALTB) successfully "destroyed" a liquid-fueled ballistic missile from an airborne platform, according to the Missile Defense Agency. A first for the directed energy weapon that we've been following since 2006. The dirty work was achieve by a modified Boeing 747-400F airframe fitted with a Northrop Grumman higher-energy laser and Lockheed Martin beam and fire control system. After an at-sea launch, the ALTB used a low-energy laser to track the target. A second, low-energy laser was used to measure and compensate for atmospheric disturbances before the megawatt-class laser was fired, "heating the boosting ballistic missile to critical structural failure." The entire episode was over just two minutes after missile launch. Good work generals, but let's see you fit that laser to a shark if you really want to impress us.
Update: Infrared images of the ALTB destroying the short-range ballistic missile after the break.
Update: Infrared images of the ALTB destroying the short-range ballistic missile after the break.
They made this to defend the airplane from the sharks with freakin' lasers when its flying over seas.
@captain P
Or from Megashark.
@SomEngangVar Megashark would just eat the whole jumbo jet in 1 bite.
@captain P
I'm a Mac, and killing sharks with lasers was my idea.
@captain P omg that makes no sense. clearly it is to defend the airplane from *birds* with lasers mounted to their heads.
@SomEngangVar Or from GIant Octopus (see movie "Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus" starring Lorenzo Lamas and Deborah Gibson)
@captain P
But now the sharks can also fly
http://www.themadhat.com/images/flying-sharks.jpg
good thing we have flying tanks
http://www.aramsay.co.nz/images//flying_tank.png
So, it's the Sharks vs. the Jets then, huh?
--snap--
--snap--
--snap--
--snap--
@Smart People Play Tuba
+2
@JamieEi He was referring to Dr. Evil in Austin Powers wanting sharks with freakin's lasers.
@SomEngangVar
Airborne Laser Testbed (ALTB).
Coming from California, it's a good thing they didn't name it:
'Airborne Laser That Totally Annihilates Bombs'
(ALT-TAB)
That could have been confusing.
@captain P
Slim Pickens kicks ass!
@captain P What if you paint the missile with a reflective paint?
@Sarcasme The Silver Surfer did that
@captain P - Silly people ... this was ACTUALLY created to defend against SHARKTOPUS. Seriously ...
http://io9.com/5470224/here-comes-sharktopus
@captain P
man, a 747 w/ a laser. thats huge. what am i gonna do w/ all these laser cats, they dont stand a chance
@Smart People Play Tuba
Utterly awesome, I stand in awe of your sense of humor and timing.
@Sarcasme
Reflective paint wouldn't work. Nor would mirrors.
There's no such thing as a 100% reflective surface. Such a material would violate the laws of physics. So even if you reflect part of the energy away, the rest of it is still going to cause the surface to heat up. As the reflective surface heated, it's properties would change, causing it to reflect even less energy away.
In short, the reflective paint would catch fire and then let the laser burn through the rest of the missile completely unimpeded.
@Smart People Play Tuba
That was awesome. I actually took my hand off the mouse for a second to snap and whistle a little.
@KingJustin
http://pix.motivatedphotos.com/2009/1/3/633666228647673689-flyingchucknorris.jpg
@Batlacit Yep. The most it would do is maybe make the process of destroying the missile take a little longer.
We're living in the future!
@mungabba Thats friggan awsome.. Arm all phasers and photon torpedoes!
@mungabba too bad the program's canceled. These are all just tests of the existing prototype.
@mungabba
I feel weird when I see the weapons I used in Starcraft appear in RL...
am I going crazy? Am I sitting in a white cell all by myself?!
I guess I'll know when the Zerglin rush approaches, I can hear them from across the mountains already...
hahaha the 747 ABL saves the world from the ultimate deterrent.
@YpoCaramel It can't be too hard to think of a missile that will be immune to this attack. like one covered in mirrors.
@cashclientel
Wouldn't work.
The mirror would have to be perfect... no blemishes.
That isn't plausible since all sorts of soot and crap get on the missile during launch.
@GErvy Wouldn't have to be perfect, just good enough to reflect part of the IR.
Gold missiles anyone?
@Freakin Ijit
Not all of the light gets reflected so the mirror heats up. This heats deforms the mirror and causes the effects of the laser to increase. After this happens it is pretty much 'all she wrote'.
@New Reformation and @GErvy - Say a shat mirror that's dirty and what not can reflect 50% of the energy of the laser. This would be enough to protect the missile. There must be a critical point at which the laser can transfer heat quicker than it can dissipate, go below that (like 50% of it's current power) and it will never get hot enough.
The window to blow it up is pretty small as well as ICBMs move much much faster than 747s, and the lasers effective range is not that far.
The whole project is a waste of money because it'll never work, is easy to defend against and stupid because it just winds up Russia, China, etc by unbalancing the current nuclear status quo. America not for the win on this one sorry.
@cashclientel Would have to be specially reinforced mirrors. a HE LASER can burn through a normal mirror.
Also think about the added weight of the mirrors on the missile if they are strong enough to resist a multi-megawatt laser.
@CraniusLupus No need to "add a mirror".
Just gold-plate the missile. Great IR reflector.
As someone else noted above, you don't have to reflect ALL the energy, just ENOUGH of the energy.
@CraniusLupus
Sufficienly polished, all metallic surface act as mirror. If the offending missile is reflecting atleast 70-75%, its survival odds increase greatly. Not all that difficult for the enemy nations to craft such a missile.
@cashclientel Come on, everybody knows mirrors doesn't work with laser, you need to use a Force Field for the missiles
@cashclientel
This isn't a laser pointer we're talking about. If you think that a mirror reflects 50% of the energy that hits it even when its clean, you're either way off or in possession of some kind of super-mirror. The math has been done on this several times: there is no material currently available that would be able to adequately defend a missile from a laser of this intensity. With cutting edge materials kept perfectly polished, you might be able to survive one or two pulses. But after that the material would heat up, warp, and start concentrating the heat instead of dispersing it.
They're not going to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a system like this without considering possible defenses against it.
@Sunil BS. I work with lasers in the lab, and given sufficient power, the lasers burn though mirrors, so you are wrong, mirrors are not good defence.
@GErvy all a missile needs are insulating tiles such as the space shuttle uses.
@TRRosen Moron.
And boom goes the dynamite
i want one on my car for when the person ahead of me is on their cellphone driving like a moron. Put our tax dollars to work and make it happen uncle sam!
@schultz That's overkill - what you need for that is just your basic car-mounted EMP:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/20/eurekas-emp-cannon-destined-for-the-marines-video/
It blows up the stairs
alone, or in pairs
everyone knows it's Laser
PEW PEW PEW!
That is all.
@gavmiller
I think this one just goes Peeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwww *boom*
"but let's see you fit that laser to shark"
grammatical error or written in code words, where "shark" refers to something...tell us what you know engadget
@zxcvbnnm
Is this engadget, or engrammar?
@flanders
so being engadget means you can make all sorts of grammatical errors?
@zxcvbnnm
In short, yes. Please see a lot of previous articles.
@zxcvbnnm
In short, yes. Please see a lot of previous articles for reference.