Drones are
everywhere right now. Their use by civilians is highly restricted in big
cities, but armed forces around the world use them for many different tasks.
Police
The Police use drones mostly for observing/recording parades and strike actions. What a couple of years back could be achieved with a helicopter, now can be achieved with a much smaller and cheaper drone. Special law enforcement units use them also in case of a bomb threat to either observe some crucial area of a city or investigate whether something is a bomb without risking lives of their officers. Police in Japan use them even to catch other drones, which are controlled by civilians (as I mentioned, use of drones by civilians is restricted in major cities). They will certainly find their use in the upcoming Euro 2016 football championship in France, which is at risk of a terrorist attack.
Recently I’ve seen on the news a drone helping officers in Wroclaw, where a homemade bomb went off at a bus stop. They probably investigated the area with this drone first to make sure there wasn’t anything else ready to explode before sending in specialists to see what it was.
Army
Drones in the army are often referred to as UAV, which stands for an unmanned aerial vehicle. Armies of the world use drones in some ways similarly to the police. They also use them for observation, recording some important footage, investigating suspicious packages. But they also use them for many other purposes. There are specialist drones that are capable of finding and disarming mines or bombs. Some UAVs are used to scout an unknown area either to find enemy forces or give heavy artillery precise coordinates. There are also drones that are used to deliver medical supplies and also those that are used for direct combat (are capable of firing missiles).
Use of drones by the police or the army isn’t anything new. But in the last couple of years it has surely increased and has become more visible on a daily basis.
What do you think about it? Have you seen any police drones yet? Do you think they are beneficial to enforce law? Or maybe they remind you of Orwell’s 1984?
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Comments
In Katowice Police is already testing drones to improve safety on the roads.
I think that every change which puts humans away from danger (e.g. when disarming a bomb, like you've mentioned) is for the better. Broken equipment is nothing compared to the loss of lives.
Reading about drones and their military use reminded me of the robot called AlphaDog, designed for delivering supplies in various types of tough terrain:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cr-wBpYpSfE
Here is an article about a drone that carried 28 pounds of heroin from Mexico to United States. In recent years, drug cartels in Mexico have begun relying more on drones to transport their drugs. The Drug Enforcement Agency reported in July of last year that drug-carrying drones made an average of 150 trips between Mexico and the United States.
A Dutch activist group was supposed to fly an abortion drone to deliver illegal pills to Poland. It was a very publicized case but I don't know if the succeeded or not. Here is an article on the official website of the group. And an article about it from The Telegraph.
Thanks for the link though, one of the comments below this video made my day, someone wrote: "I don't see a use for this beyond the marines riding it into battle", which is something I can't get out of my head now :D
When it comes to smuggling drugs, of course people who do it use the newest technologies, but I've also seen a show on Discovery where they shown how some Mexican gang was smuggling drugs across the border with USA by projecting them from catapults. It's funny how sometimes the oldest solution is used to achieve a better result than some newer ones.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3251289/Marijuana-bundle-drops-sky-slams-familys-carport.html - here You got pretty interesting idea of using drons :D Enjoy!
Besides, there are new era of drones - compact drones with AI that are able to investigate autonomously set goals. You know, those which do look like birds, bugs and small animals. Also the last one I saw - the drone which is able to swim underwater.
When it comes to those armored suits, the old fantasy of unnmanned vehicles fighting on the frontlines instead of soldiers is slowly becoming the reality. We'll see how it will develop further, but I can see how that can actually endanger civillians in the long run, because targeting them would have an incomparably bigger impact than fighting the enemy army.
Thanks for the article. It was really interesting. I think most of the time we completely don't realise all our movements are monitored one way or another. It's easy to feel paranoid, when you start to think about it.
On the other hand, it's clear that drones are extremely helpful in difficult situations and save lives.
Anyway, I think we can expect that the drone trend will expand into the non-official spheres. It's fairly cheap to build your own drone, if you can't afford to buy one, and people will certainly find uses for them. Like for example paparazzi's job would be much easier in some cases.
As for the military use of unmanned vehicles and other things like that - South Korea is using automated turrets that can identify and shoot a man from three kilometers away. Put that thing on wheels and you don't need to wait for the next Terminator movie.