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I can already imagine ships being outfitted with hundreds of anti aircraft autocannons just for shooting down drone swarms, kind of like the USN ships of WWII. An old solution for a new problem
submersible drones could be a problem, especialy if engineered for water travel and aerial travel
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Deploying point defense technologies over a city/civilian targets has some obvious problems, though. Lasers, electronic countermeasures, tangly stuff, etc, are much more attractive than systems that fire thousands of cannon rounds per minute or that launch explosive missiles.
From the phalanx wiki: Whereas naval Phalanx systems fire tungsten armor-piercing rounds, the C-RAM uses the 20–mm HEIT-SD (High-Explosive Incendiary Tracer, Self-Destruct) ammunition, originally developed for the M163 Vulcan Air Defense System.[26][34] These rounds explode on impact with the target, or on tracer burnout, thereby greatly reducing the risk of collateral damage from rounds that fail to hit their target…
A CIWS is not a reasonable way to stop drone attacks on civilian targets.
Wouldn't the solution be jamming or EMP related? Of course, because the technological system must propagate itself at any cost this idea is counter-intuitive. Technological progress is seen as bending towards an inherent good. People never stop to think if it will be bad. Now people are to live in fear of drone swarms because nobody has autonomy in the technological system. People think they control technology, but i…
Jamming would address inter-swarm communications, but then they'd revert to solo operations. EMP isn't realistic, but microwave systems have already been tested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlmf032NmHU
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There are a number of bulky systems intended for larger targets which will work against drones, but most are not very portable. Ship-mounted systems such as CWIS do work.[1] But all those shells that don't hit the target land someplace. [1] https://youtu.be/3UVuV5WvraQ
> But all those shells that don't hit the target land someplace. Just don't miss! It's only a few hundred meters out. Oh CWIS are only ship-mounted? I thought it was a general term. I like PDC better anyway. #TheExpanse Nice video—are those all tracers though?
C-RAM shells are supposed to self-destruct, but EOD guys will tell you that fuzes do not have a 100% operational rate. Another problem is cost and magazine size:
>The Block 1A and newer (pneumatic driven) CIWS mounts fire at a rate of 4,500 rounds per minute with a 1,550-round magazine.
>Shells fired by the Phalanx cost around $30 each and the gun typically fires 100 or more when engaging a target.[14]
So it's about three grand to zap one drone, and you get 15 shootdowns before a human needs to shovel more ammo into the turret. That would make it vulnerable to a saturation attack. A hundred drones carrying grenades that home in on the CIWS radar would be tough to counter.
> The potential of consumer or commercial drones harming world leaders became immediately evident when a protester hovered one close to German chancellor Angela Merkel at a campaign rally in 2013 Pretty arbitrary incident to choose, but I suppose the writer would have felt silly mentioning the flying dildos that buzzed Gary Kasparov at a political event in 2008.
https://ktla.com/news/nationworld/new-mexico-sheriff-running...
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Slow and easy to kill? Seen a drone race? At what range and with what weapon would they be easy to kill? How long would the kill take? At what range could the drone be killed at? Sure often drones fly in straight lines or hover. But in an adversarial environment they could easily move pseudo randomly and be quite difficult to kill.
Here's a line of cops shooting at race drones. They would've had plenty of time to escape if they weren't sticking around to find out how long it takes to get shot down. These were race drones from 5 years ago and modern ones can be around twice as fast. Not to mention you don't want to dump a magazine upwards in your own territory. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xq0oCM37oZA
That is what birdshot is for. Birdshot, e.g. "No. 9 or 10" shot, are tiny lead BBs about 2mm diameter. Because they are small, they have a large surface area to mass ratio, and consequently, they fall back down to earth at a low, safe speed. When they land on dry leaves, they bounce off and sound a bit like rain. When it is shot into the air and falls back down onto you, it won't even bruise you, let alone injure you. (However it can kill if fired directly at somebody.)
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if you can make a unabomber type of device you can construct a weaponized quadrocopter thinking further, even just the manner, or tactics used when flying could be weapon like, such as chaff drones
> if you can make a unabomber type of device you can construct a weaponized quadrocopter It’s trivial, cheap, and simple to do massive harm to massive numbers of people. Fortunately, humans don’t usually do this unless part of the government/military. In a country of 300 million, the only non-state mass death events are a handful of terrorist attacks and deranged teenagers determined to shoot up their schools. The an…
In 2020, 446 people died in mass shootings in the US. [2]
1. https://komonews.com/news/local/seattle-traffic-deaths-remai...
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_...
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Modern CIWS are designed to be effective against substantially faster and more agile rockets. Drones really are slow and easy to take down compared to guided rockets and especially kinetic ones, and the military has been working on means of defending against those for decades. The Phalanx is being modified to serve as an anti-UAS system, for example. The challenge is more to do with detection than firing.
Dunno, do agile rockets dodge? Or just follow a simple preprogrammed patterns (like low, then pop up to attack from above)? Not sure a CIWS system that can hit a mach 2 missile that doesn't dodge would necessarily handle the same $$$ spent on a N cheaper drones. How many minutes of firing do modern CIWS systems typically have? Loitering at max engagement range and dodging might well end up using ammo at a rate that t…
Modern antiship missiles have complex programs. Some are capable of flying in formation with each other, with one missile flying high for visibility and communicating with the other missiles in the formation that are flying very low. If/when the missile on top is destroyed, another missile in the formation can be automatically selected to take its place.
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Pretty easy to protect electronics from rf energy.
Not if it also needs to have an antenna to listen with. That's always going to be an easy way in.