Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Barf-Beam Next Defensive Weapon?

Just after you see the light, you barf.

It looks like a big flashlight — but it's really a nonlethal weapon designed to make you sick.
Intelligent Optical Systems, Inc., of Torrance, Calif., has been granted a contract by the Department of Homeland Security to develop what it calls the "LED Incapacitator," according to a DHS online newsletter.

The handheld device using light-emitting diodes to emit super-bright pulses of light at rapidly changing wavelengths, causing disorientation, nausea and even vomiting in whomever it's pointed at.

The handheld device using light-emitting diodes to emit super-bright pulses of light at rapidly changing wavelengths, causing disorientation, nausea and even vomiting in whomever it's pointed at.

• Click here to read the newsletter writeup.

"There's one wavelength that gets everybody," says IOS President Bob Lieberman. "Vlad [IOS top scientist Vladimir Rubtsov] calls it 'the evil color.'"

This is not likely to be a popular home-defense weapon where there is white carpeting.

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