Why War?
why-war.com
This site needs $50/month to operate. Please help us by donating $5.

Sort By:   View full list of sources

New Scientist

Sutton, Surrey, United Kingdom — www.newscientist.com

Flash Mob Supercomputer Misses Its Target

Will Knight | New Scientist | April 5, 2004

"The resulting machine, dubbed FlashMob, would have needed to perform a rigorous benchmark calculation called Linpack at a rate of at least 403 billion flops (floating point operations per second) to be ranked as one of the top 500 supercomputers. But FlashMob only reached a relatively modest peak performance of 180 billion flops." [more]

Pilotless Plane to Fly Routinely in Civilian Airspace

Duncan Graham-Rowe | New Scientist | August 21, 2003

"Pentagon data on the number of crashes per hours flown show that the Global Hawk has a crash rate 50 times higher than the F-16 fighter, a plane that frequently flies more dangerous missions and at lower altitudes." [more]

Gamma-Ray Weapons Could Trigger Next Arms Race

David Hambling | New Scientist | August 13, 2003

"The effect of a nuclear-isomer explosion would be to release high-energy gamma rays capable of killing any living thing in the immediate area. This material could cause long-term health problems for anybody who breathed it in." [more]

'Soft Walls' Could Keep Hijacked Planes at Bay

Anil Ananthaswamy | New Scientist | July 3, 2003

"If a plane was flying with a no-fly-zone to the left, and the pilot started banking left to enter the zone, the avionics would counter by banking right. Lee's system, called 'soft walls', would first gently resist the pilot, and then become increasingly forceful until it prevailed." [more]

Nuclear-Powered Drone Aircraft on Drawing Board

Duncan Graham-Rowe | New Scientist | February 19, 2003

"The US Air Force is examining the feasibility of a nuclear-powered version of an unmanned aircraft. The USAF hopes that such a vehicle will be able to 'loiter' in the air for months without refuelling, striking at will when a target comes into its sights." [more]

Fighter Plane's Laser May Blind Civilians

Jeff Hecht | New Scientist | July 24, 2002

"The 100-kilowatt infrared laser, which is being developed for the F35 Joint Strike Fighter by defence companies Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, is far more powerful than any laser ever used in war. But because it is designed to attack targets such as other fighter aircraft, ground vehicles and anti-aircraft batteries, it is exempt from the Geneva Convention's ban on blinding weapons." [more]

1–6 of 6 records found matching your criteria.