Within a year, a pair of souped-up $2.7 billion blimps (price includes R&D) will be floated 10,000 feet above the District of Columbia and act as a 340-mile-wide eye in the sky, detecting incoming missiles and the like.
The design and testing phase for JLENS—the (deep breath) Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System, produced by Raytheon, a major weapons manufactuer—is over, relays Program Director Doug Burgess to Popular Mechanics. Now, it is time for implementation. Or, as he puts it, "[We're] getting away from the Ph.D. engineer types running the system to the 20- or 25-year-old soldier running the system."
Click here to see a picture of how very similar blimps were used during WWII to suspend aircraft-fouling barbed wired above London
Added: Rabel does some independent research and finds that the blimps (aerostats) will be tethered:
It has the ability to maintain persistent surveillance and monitor activity in its area of operations 24/7 for periods of twenty-five (25) days continuously at altitudes of at least 2,500 and up to 5,000 ft AGL with a mobile mooring platform emplaced at elevations of at least 6000ft above sea level (ASL) and climatic conditions characteristic of the CENTCOM AOR.
29 comments:
If the DOD & Congress are rational every major coastal city and military and civilian port should be so protected...but the money will probably be siphoned-off to fund the latest reincarnation of ACORN if the Donkey party has its way..
The old ones were called barrage balloons.
These will probably have little NSA mics and cameras.
If Christie became president, fat chance, we'd have a blimp in the White House.
I have a friend who follows blimps, in the sense of noticing their appearances in culture, like in that 2004 movie, "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," which wasn't really in the future but in an alternate version of 1939.
But never mind. My friend considers blimp appearances shorthand cues for "we are in the future."
I guess we are in the future now.
Click through to the full story -- there is a description of the barrage balloons over London, which I did not know about, but hubby, for some reason did. I don't remember anything about them from the Churchill War Room museum in London. Mmm.
Actually it sounds like a good idea (watch the promo video too.)
And yes, I am sure they can be equipped with mics and cameras ... ;- )
"Person of Interest" and "NCIS-LA" are here and now.
It annoys me that "Blimpie" holds itself out as "America's Sub Shop."
Either you're selling blimps or you're selling subs.
Make up your damn mind!
Those barrage blimps were a lot more... passive and numerous. This would be a persistent detection system. You could probably even mount some sort of anti-missile reaction system on such blimps, although it probably would be less problematic to network them with batteries on the ground, all things being equal.
But never mind. My friend considers blimp appearances shorthand cues for "we are in the future."
Really? I consider them kind of retro. What's that term of art for lost and archaic iconography of the "future" that now appears terribly dated? Zeerust! Blimps and airships especially are classic zeerust.
I believe I read about these elsewhere, and they are closer to being Zeppelin airships than "blimps."
It's a tethered balloon.
Do not be deceived by appearances.
According to the link they are pretty sophisticated.
Don't know that they are tethered.
The one troubling comment on the link I saw was the flip "20 to 25 year old" "running the system" (whatever that means).
At Pearl Harbor the incoming attack was missed because some new LT blew off the radar operators' (a new technology, to be sure) report without checking it out further.
I respect our military, but I would rather not have a 20 year old newbie "running" the system. ;- )
Probably a bit of hyperbole on his part to heighten the contrast with the "PhD engineer types."
Yeah, because there have been so many instances in the last 50 years where missiles were launched at Washington DC.
Fucking hell.
Hey it happens all the time. In the movies.
They have a new one where the heroic young black president defeats terrorists who hijack the White House.
It is almost like a documentary or something.
Tethered it is.
"Yeah, because there have been so many instances in the last 50 years where missiles were launched at Washington DC."
See what a good job they're doing.
I hope they let at least a few rockets slip past so we can see if Anderson Cooper still has what it takes.
Yeah Troop, but I've heard that movie's got lower ratings than the real thing.
Blimps over DC.
Aren't there enough goddamn blimps in DC?
MTB@12:05pm/
And to add insult to injury Blimpie's not even an American company..
Rush caller Greg in Nashua NH says Sarah Palin is laying down the gambit. (14:27 eastern)
Mmmm....Sarah Palin laying down....
JAL:
"The one troubling comment on the link I saw was the flip "20 to 25 year old" "running the system" (whatever that means)."
I think it means our computer game playing nephews will be grist for the mill.
rh:
"Rush caller Greg in Nashua NH says Sarah Palin is laying down the gambit. (14:27 eastern)"
If her gambit is to rabble rouse and run interference, you go girl.
Mitchell @2:51 lol what does that even mean?
@ Rabel --
You are correct, tethered it is.
Well since airspace is restricted anyway, I guess the chances of general aviation planes flying into the tethers is minimal, plus the design includes some kind of tether avoidance thing also.
Do the DC hospitals use medical helicopters? Those seem to be the things that fly into unexpected objects. Nothing like having a vertical cable in you rotors.
your
IS NOT A BALLOON. iS UN AIRSHIP! GO OUTSIDE!
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EQyrd1BwusQ
Yes, Christopher, but apparently it is to be tethered over its assigned area.
Well thank you, Deborh. And please, call me chris.
If you have a moment, watch the clip. The airship appears to be flying, but all the members of the House of Lords fall into the same home. Perhaps the airship is tethered! Perhaps I should spend less time thinking about the physics of Monty Python sketches!?!
Nah.
Cjf
lol, Chris, I apologize for not looking at your link earlier.
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