Pew!pew!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Looks like LM has been awarded a contract to develop a laser based weapon for fighter aircraft:

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/ar...ghters-442928/

Its part of a programme called Self-protect High Energy Laser Demonstrator (SHiELD) - I do wonder if some of the people involved are fans of the Marvel universe??

[Ttaskmaster]

News at Ten: Lockheed Martin sued by Marvel Comics.

[Zak33]

Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub

[Sam__]

Surely once anti-aircraft lasers come out it will be worthless having anything in the air.

[Lowe]

Mirrored armour?

[Sam__]

Mirrored armour?

with active aim shielding to reflect it back where it came!

[Ttaskmaster]

Surely once anti-aircraft lasers come out it will be worthless having anything in the air.

Nope.
Because you'll just have highly-trained, covert anti-laser units (or perhaps just single agents/operatives) who move in to sabotage the laser emplacements ahead of when the aircraft are sent in.

[Zak33]

Nope.
Because you'll just have highly-trained, covert anti-laser units (or perhaps just single agents/operatives) who move in to sabotage the laser emplacements ahead of when the aircraft are sent in.

or mortars

[ik9000]

omg, is everything in life a Tom Clancy novel? First 9-11 is not too disimilar to debt of honour/sum of all fears, then we get the massive economic crash, then the weird wars and russian invasion of Ukraine (red bear rising) and all this laser stuff sounds remarkable like Cardinal of the Kremlin...

[Bagnaj97]

Mirrored armour?

It's not quite that simple. "Regular" mirrors simply aren't reflective enough, and heat up enough to be damaged. Dielectric mirrors are reflective enough (99.99%), but only cover a limited range of wavelengths.
https://www.popsci.com/laser-guns-ar...-fighting-back is quite an interesting read!

[Sam__]

Nope.
Because you'll just have highly-trained, covert anti-laser units (or perhaps just single agents/operatives) who move in to sabotage the laser emplacements ahead of when the aircraft are sent in.

or some kind of quantum bomb where you blow up something near you and it actually takes out something half way across the universe because of quantum entanglement and other big words I don't understand fully.

[Sam__]

It's not quite that simple. "Regular" mirrors simply aren't reflective enough, and heat up enough to be damaged. Dielectric mirrors are reflective enough (99.99%), but only cover a limited range of wavelengths.
https://www.popsci.com/laser-guns-ar...-fighting-back is quite an interesting read!

"It was back in 1973 that an Air Force experimental laser first shot down a drone."

I had no idea the tech had been around that long in the field.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

"It was back in 1973 that an Air Force experimental laser first shot down a drone."

I had no idea the tech had been around that long in the field.

In 1985,they tested out the MIRACL against a static Titan stage on the ground:

http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/...re-id517353660
https://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/miracl.htm

[Sam__]

In 1985,they tested out the MIRACL against a static Titan stage on the ground:

http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/...re-id517353660
https://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/miracl.htm

MIRACLE - Mid-Infrared Advanced Chemical Laser

back when acronyms were actually descriptive!

[Ttaskmaster]

or mortars

Nah, it'll be shielded against those... Why do you think I'm out of a job!!

[Pob255]

In 1985,they tested out the MIRACL against a static Titan stage on the ground:

http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/...re-id517353660
https://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/miracl.htm

It's a shame they cheated in those demonstrations, note the cross bars over the top, and the large hydraulic pistons attached via cables.
They basically put them under massive load to the point that a weak blow with a hammer would collapse them and they would collapse spectacularly.