In a move straight out of an internet cliche, the US Navy are deploying robot boats which could be used to hunt pirates. Life used to imitate art – now it’s imitating web cliches, leaving us with no option but to destroy all computers or kill ourselves before the furry Harry Potter slash fiction arrives. Or the robot boats kill us.

The ‘Protector’ maritime vessel can be operated remotely, or set to autonomous operation for long patrol routes. With a top speed of 55 miles per hour and a radio control range of ten miles, the worlds most awesome remote control toy could be used to investigate suspicious vessels while the fleshy, non-fixable-with-a-wrench components of the crew stay safely out of harms way.

Non-lethal models are under investigation, while the regular version comes equipped with a 7.62 mm machine gun. Some argue that a version that can’t autonomously spray people with bullets is necessary to investigate manned vessels, but considering that modern pirates have been known to fake distress calls and then loot (and sometimes kill) those who respond, many probably wouldn’t be too upset if they happen to run into a storm of bullets launched by an aquatic terminator.

With piracy a genuine and growing problem in the waters off Somalia and the Philippines we can expect to see more of these silicon skiffs developed and deployed. A British firm is developing a robotic jetski as an unarmed scout (or as the plot of an eighties Saturday TV show).

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Entry was posted on Thursday, November 1st, 2007 at 2:42 pm under Crime, Piracy, Science and technology.

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