This beer can-sized gadget is one of the most surprising military inventions ever. Launched from a cannon, it allows to infiltrate any pirate’s ship with ease. Jack Sparrow, beware!
Magnetic Recon-Bot by American manufacturer Recon Robotics is truly amazing. It’s durable enough to be fired from a cannon. When it gets to the ship it was aimed at (pirate, most likely) it sticks magnetically to the ship’s side and climbs it all the way up. Being so tiny, it’s perhaps hardly noticeable. Recon Robotics describes it “marsupial”, because there’s another bot, equipped with an infrared camera, nesting inside the bigger one.
When the smaller robot is deployed on the board, it wanders around looking for pirates, hostages, illegal cargo, etc. and sends the footage to the operator. The Recon-Bot is most likely launched from a remote controlled unmanned vessel, allowing very quiet operations.
“We believe that this micro-robot platform could help mitigate maritime piracy threats and protect the lives of naval personnel and anti-piracy teams,” says Alan Bignall from Recon Robotics. However, it’s not difficult to imagine Recon-Bot being used for things other than fighting piracy. Hopefully, the pirates won’t get into possession of such spy droids, that would make their job much easier. It’s being developed in cooperation with US Navy so let’s hope there won’t be any commercial release…
Actually, this robot is a maritime, magnetic version of the Recon Scout Throwbot which is being used by U.S. military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Probably its biggest advantage is the shape, on most occasions the remote controlled Throwbot lands in a position that allows movement and then it records video and sends the footage to the command station up to 1000 ft away.
And that’s how the land version works:
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Via: PopSci / The Register
