Free Electron Laser weapon in 2016 and "Real Genius" movie

[jefferiestubes8]

Remember the laser weapon in the 1980s film "Real Genius"?

The Navy says they will have a prototype in 2016.

last April, when the Navy put a test laser firing a (relatively weak) 15-kilowatt beam aboard a decommissioned destroyer. Never before had a laser cannon at sea disabled an enemy vessel. But the Martime Laser Demonstrator cut through choppy California waters, an overcast sky and salty sea air to burn through the outboard engine of a moving motorboat a mile away. You can see video of the successful demonstration above.

the Free Electron Laser, that can generate up to a megawatt’s worth of blast power. Currently, the laser blasts 14 kilowatts of light — think 140 lamps, all shining in the same direction and at the same wavelength. A hundred kilowatts is considered militarily useful; a megawatt beam would burn through 20 feet of steel in a single second.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/03/navy-lasers-four-years/


Imagine UAV drones with these.

 

[PurpleBuddha]

Ah lasers...one of the few things that gets me more hot than rail guns.