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Navy patent reveals underwater sound weapon
The U.S. Navy certainly doesn't seem to have any shortage of unconventional weapons in development, but it looks like it still has plenty more ideas on its plate, with a recent patent revealing yet another new weapon that takes a slightly different path towards its target. While this one is unconventional, it certainly doesn't appear to be non-lethal, employing sonar to generate what the Navy describes as "acoustic remote cavitation," which can supposedly destroy torpedoes, mines, and any other "undesirable objects" in its path. What's more, the Navy says that can be done from a distance of up to one kilometer away, which is apparently far greater than other similar examples of the technology. Less clear, however, is how the Navy plans to deal with the seemingly inevitable swarms of irate dolphins set on enacting some revenge. [Via Danger Room]
Thermonor body temp regulation tubes to be tested by US Navy
Leave it to the contemporary descendants of the Vikings, to come up with a way to help American sailors stay physically afloat longer; Congress has just approved $500,000 for testing of five Norwegian-made "temperature management" units. The firm behind this invention, Thermonor, claims to have built a device that can alter an injured sailor's limb by encasing it in a plastic cylinder to keep the body's temperature high enough to avoid hypothermia and also pressurized enough to control severe bleeding. Still though, Thermonor may want to work on the product's design a little more just so that the patient doesn't feel like they've been turned into a freakish version of Captain Hook.
