Update: TALON SWORDS Still In Iraq But Not Active, Malfunctions Overstated
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Wednesday, 16 of April , 2008 at 1:32 am
Last week Popular Science reported that Foster Miller TALON SWARDS armed robots were pulled out of Iraq because of a malfunction where “the gun started moving when it was not intended to move,” which is a potentially very dangerous thing to have happen. I took the position that even if there were some serious bugs to be worked out, it was still worth keeping the SWORDS robots in active development because of their future potential to replace humans in dangerous areas. Now it appears that the problems that the robots were having were seriously overstated… Here is what actually happened, according to Danger Room, who spoke directly to Foster Miller:
“The whole thing is an urban legend,” says Foster Miller spokesperson Cynthia Black, of the reports about SWORDS moving its gun without a command. There were three cases of uncommanded movements, but all three were prior to the 2006 safety certification, she says. “One case involved a loose wire. So, now there is now redundant wiring on every circuit. One involved a solder, a connection that broke. everything now is double-soldered.” The third case was a test were the robot was put on a 45 degree hill and left to run for two and a half hours. “When the motor started to overheat, the robot shut the motor off, that caused the robot to slide back down the incline,” she says. “Those are the three uncommanded movements.”
Just to reemphasize, all three of those movements were prior to the 2006 safety certification. And it’s also worth reemphasizing that these systems are basically complicated remote controlled robots, and they certainly cannot fire their weapons without a human pushing a button. So, what is holding back the deployment of the SWORDS system? National Defense has the answer, after the jump.
The first three armed ground robots deployed onto a battlefield are stuck behind sandbags and are not patrolling Iraqi streets as its inventors envisioned, said a senior executive with its manufacturer, Foster-Miller Inc.
Last summer, three special weapons observation remote reconnaissance direct action systems (SWORDS) were shipped to Iraq after three years of development at the Army’s Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center at Picatinny Arsenal, N.J. The robots carry M249 light machine guns, which are remotely controlled by a soldier through a terminal. Senior Army leadership, however, was not comfortable with sending them out to do combat missions due to safety reasons, and they are now placed in fixed positions, said Robert Quinn, vice president of Talon operations at Foster-Miller.
“If you have a mobile weapons platform that can’t be mobile, and it becomes nothing more than a fixed position, then why not just put it on a tripod,” he told National Defense. It seems to be a “chicken or the egg” situation for the Army, he said. The tactics, techniques and procedures for using armed ground robots have not been addressed. But until there is an adequate number of SWORDS to train with, these issues can’t be worked out, he said.
The government in general, and the military specifically, seems (with a few exceptions) to be rather slow when it comes to adopting new technology, especially if the technology doesn’t provide an immediate tactical advantage. At this stage, the biggest advantage provided by SWORDS is taking the place of a human in some scenarios, and it doesn’t appear (appear) that this is enough motivation for SWORDS to be taken as seriously as, I think, it should be.
VIA [ Danger Room ]
PS- Just as I was posting this, what should come on TV but a commercial from the US Navy, with the tagline: “working every day to unman the front lines.” Sigh.
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Comment by joshua
Made Monday, 16 of March , 2009 at 9:26 am
hi this is a bad weapon as i am going in the army i shell keep a look out for this lol