Official News - page 6

REAL LIFE NEWS: SET PHASERS TO "PUKE"

by Hazed

In the never-ending search for a reliable non-lethal weapon, the US Navy is funding research into a phaser that uses radio-frequency emissions to temporarily disrupt the balance and coordination of the target - in effect, giving them extreme motion sickness. A kind of vomit-inducing raygun!

It's being designed for use by Marines in urban combat. The emissions are capable of passing through walls so the weapon could be used from outside a building to affect those inside. Like all good projects, it's got an acronym, EPIC, which stands for Electromagnetic Personnel Interdiction Control.

In 2004, a Texan company called Invocon was given £99,609 as a development contract. They now claim, rather long-windedly, that "the first known demonstration of a vestibular response to an electromagnetic stimulus has been performed," which I think means they've tested it and it worked.

More information on the vomit ray at http://www.navysbirprogram.com/NavySearch/Award/award.aspx?pk=C18BA979-DADB-4892-896A-1E89970EA8BD.

Fed2 Star index Previous issues Fed 2 home page