Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones are becoming inevitable ingredients in many lifestyles, from package delivery to weather forecasting, although perhaps not always welcome. As the world recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Federal Aviation Administration has established strict rules for the use of drones in populated areas, with its most recent Operations Over People mandate setting the need to register a drone with the FAA and establishing requirements for an unmanned aerial systems (UAS) at night and over populated areas. Lasers may also provide a way to prevent excessive damage from an out-of-control UAS at a public event (see the figure).
Evan Hunt, director of high-energy lasers and counter-UAS at Raytheon Intelligence & Space (RI&S), a Raytheon Technologies business, explained some of the growing problems with drones: “Drones are becoming more sophisticated and dangerous, and many can be easily designed to be immune to things like jamming,” said Hunt. “To defeat them, authorities around sporting events need new ways to precisely identify and track these drones at long distances and, if deemed threatening, quickly eliminate them.”
The high-energy-laser weapon system (HELWS) developed by RI&S is paired with the company’s rich tradition in radar technology to detect drones from several miles away and provide weapon system’s operators a clear view of the target even in highly populated areas such as public sporting events. Once a UAS has been identified as a threat, it can be destroyed in mid-flight by an accurately aimed high-power laser beam. Of course, in a populated area, the ruins of a rogue drone may pose danger to the crowd below and Justin Martin, a program manager for the HELWS at RIAS says: “To mitigate risks to the public, HELWS can be pre-programed with safety zones where the system will automatically inhibit the laser from being used. Conversely, areas that are determined safe to bring down a drone, such as an empty field or body of water, are pre-loaded into the system—these areas are ideal to stop a threat.” The laser systems are compact enough to be positioned around public places and even on the back of pickup trucks and tactical vehicles as a deterrent to dangerous drones.