Inside the Rocket-Proof Obamamobile [Cars]

Isn't it sort of sad that the president has to be encased in essential a tank to protect him from attacks foreign and domestic?

The former Canadian Prime Minister drove around in a Volvo, he drove himself.

The current one has an armored limo, only because he wanted to feel important.

....to protect him from attacks foreign and domestic?

Yep. But anyone that wants that job is either an egomaniac or a buffoon anyway. Never needed those precautions back in HST's day.

Hi

If this protection fails, well really, when is he ever going to be inside of it? You will have a civil war in your country if any thing would happen to the President in waiting! The King incident back in LA will then look like a camp fire.

Please give him a chance! I assume (I love that word because it makes certain things into others) his chances of surviving his first four years are not very high and I have made up some stats to work out his chances.

I am informed that 10% of Americans hate the darker race. That makes about 20 million. Take 10% of those, who would not be in a room with a Black Fella (we can call them that in Australia). That is 2 mil. Take 10% of those who would like to get rid of him, but not kill, that would be 200 thousand. Take 10% of those which comes to 20 thousand, they would kill given the opportunity. Take 10% of those which is 2000, they would kill if paid. Take 10% of those which is 200, they would kill if not paid. Take 10% of those which is 20!!! They are the ones that can cause the USA the biggest loss in the history of the world as we are supposed to know it. What are his chances? Any statisticians out there.

Give Peace a Chance, please

Love You's All, Ky.

Leaving the issue of motives behind, but rather just considering what the Secret Service has done, it seems extreme.

- They are defending against snipers - the .50 caliber kind that can hit a mark from a mile away. Consider the Obama transition office in downtown Washington, DC. They closed off all streets for at least two blocks in all directions and put under control all roof tops with line-of-site access. (I don't know for sure what they can do about all the windows. There are systems able to automatically intercept in-coming bullets in flight.)

- The vehicle is configured for defense against nuclear, biological, chemical, electrical (emp), directed energy and radiological weapons.

- The vehicle is configured in a manner reminiscent of a main battle tank, able to defend against not only shoulder-fired weapons but also most self-mobile weapons - wheeled or tracked. Most anything short of a main battle tank

- There are subtle changes in downtown DC, most notably around the capital building, that seem to (or could, at least) reflect new installations that are hidden and will be deployed on when needed. These would perhaps be remote sensor systems and/or anti-armor weapons, or something that does not occur to me at all.

- (it has been reported) Patriot missile defense batteries stationed around town have been increased in number and and types upgraded.

- Various senior people in and near govrnment (including General Colin Powell) have made it clear that a very serious crisis will occur (or is expected) on or about 20 Jan.

I am stretching a bit here, and it might be excessively so, but it seems entirely possible the defense is designed to repel an armored assault in force, at least long enough for primary actions. I have difficulty conceiving of such a thing in down town DC with 3 million visitors on hand (which is projected.)

Am I insane? Perhaps just a worry wart? But, the symptoms exist.

Guest -- You are not insane. The worst threats are the ones that are unimaginable except to a few who are conveniently ignored. A perfect example was the use of passenger jet liners to destroy the WTC. Bad symptoms exist everywhere, not the least of which is in the developing world where many intelligent minds are grasping the details of modern technologies in order to further their own destructive agendas.

If terrorist tactics in the Middle East, especially Iraq, are any example our restrictions on the availability of modern high explosives is a very good thing. Fortunately we have kept such material from becoming a consumer commodity the way modern hand carried firearms are.

The good part is that the form and detectability of weapons capable of launching lethal projectiles from a substantial standoff distance is within our capabilities to produce "armor". The scary side is that armor against the lethal products of modern chemistry is much less well developed and their future form is much harder to predict for the purpose of advance planning of defenses.

What I fear the most is some future "invention" of a compact high explosive that can be concocted simply from readily available consumer products. We already have that, but fortunately none of the current generation of such bad stuff is easily concealed on a person's body. An amount required to produce an incident making worldwide headlines seems to require a decent sized vehicle for transport.

I'd like to think that we have good defenses against the illegal importation of "bad stuff" in the high explosives category. Hopefully we have protected such technologies to keep them from falling into the hands of people that would like to discover methods of rendering explosive materials undetectable. This suggests an important corollary to the old saying "If I can measure it I can make it", one of my favorites, BTW.

Ed Weldon

Ed Weldon:

A perfect example was the use of passenger jet liners to destroy the WTC.

When the world trade center was originally designed, it was designed to survive the impact of a Boeing 707, The largest passenger jet at the time. The done this because the impact of the bomber that hit the empire state building in the 40's? Though that was an accident.

Freedom has it costs, its a matter of giving up some of the freedoms (if at least temporary) to crack down and be proactive.

But you still have the critics that would say how do you know you prevented it, when it never happed. Its what they call a "CATCH 22"

phoenix911

All the more perfect an example. The possibility of the outcome of the WTC impacts was thought to be a non issue if thought of at all.

The worst possible scenario can come from the place you think you have covered. The fact in this situation is that the original design assumptions were not fully understood and were trumped by new developments, in this case technological.

How many of our great human accomplishments contain an assumption flaw that is no longer valid in the face of current conditions and perhaps lies buried in the archives of a long ago engineering effort, unnoticed or impossible to find?

Ed Weldon

I would call it a "CAUGHT 44"

"There are systems able to automatically intercept in-coming bullets in flight.)"

In respect to an automobile, As far as I know of these are called targets.

Bullet proof glass is a well known technology.

problem is .... How big a bullet?

Same Guest.

The systems I refer to are not passive; they do not simply block the projectile as does a wall. Well, one does. Anyway, these systems have radar or lidar based systems to detect some physical characteristic of the act of firing (usually.) This might be the compression wave of firing, a particular motion of the platform or barrel, or just the flight of the round. (Sound-based systems generally work only for second-round prevention. That would be called "counter-battery." Its goal would be to eliminate the source.) This is triangulated and provides a starting point for tracking. The round is tracked only long enough to establish position and balistics - a very brief time. Then a counter-measure is deployed. The CM might be a penetration-resistant wall that is raised quickly to block the round. Simple and effective. A more sophisticated system might launch a projectile to intercept it, or use a projected energy beam to damage it or simply change its shape enough to significantly modify its balistic path.

These systems work best on the rounds least affected by personnal body armer - .50 caliber and up. These rounds tend to be relatively slow and fired from greater distance, allowing reaction times. A 3 to 5 inch round tends to contain high explosives which are susceptible to detonation with appropriate encouragement.

I am aware only of prototypes.

I dread to think what might happen to some little old blue haired bible totin' mother goose if and when her K-car backfires.

Imagine the headlines. Here's one from Texas.

http://www.chumfm.com/MorningShow/bits/march24.swf

Reactive armor would not be a surprise

I'll give it a good answer as well!

Heads of state have always been prime targets. This is even more so today, from presidents to popes. It's actually better these days. Instead of a head being surrounded by a human shield, that shield is now replaced by armor plate.

"A CD changer? What is this? 1994?"

Wow, that means that they finally upgraded from the Craig 8-track player!

Wait a minute!Do you mean my Craig 4+4 is obsolete now? What will they think of next! By the way, as there is not a perfect insulator, there is no perfect armor.It is always an arms race, and armor is usually designed after the fact,so it trails in technology. Witness the fact that an Abrams M-60 tank was disabled by a single round about the diameter of a pencil.It was made of some unidentified(to the general public) orange material that penetrated the armor at the armpit (below the turret) without spalling, and disabled the main computer,went through the kidney area of body armor and lodged into the opposite side.What was it?A secret sniper weapon or classified Russian RPG? A magnetic pulse accelerated round at hypervelocity? Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? Only the shadow knows!

they do need protection, but what do socialopaths do? they watch CNN coverage in Iraq and learn to make bigger bombs. That take out their target and the people around him/her.

I had the opposite reaction to the "CD changer" comments at the article site.

CD's are one step removed in fidelity from the true analog signal. MP3's are one step further removed. I'm no longer an "audiophile" (used to be in the 60's) but those who make fun of older technology may not know the shortcomings of their modern counterparts. Although digital TV is slowly getting better it's response time is not on par with an "old" CRT. Motion tends to blur much sooner on DTV vs. analog. And the pixellation can be more maddening than a slightly snowy picture.

True, digital techniques elimnate what we normally call noise -- hiss, etc. from audio and snow/static on video. But there are sacrifices. If analog standards had been upgraded to accomodate the resolution of HDTV and the same amount of money applied to creating matching products, scoffers might be surprised at what would have been achieved.

Given the content of a lot of modern music and video, I guess it may not matter. That, too, has shortcomings vs. yesteryears.

Before one blindly accepts that technology always advances to the "best" alternative, please do a little research to know what the shortcomings are.

I still enjoy listening to some old 33 records. I have some albums in both cd and vinyl. It is amazing the difference in the character of the sound. While the Cd's are clear and clean, they seem sterile and lack the life of the vinyl.

I'm sure there's more on board than just a CD changer anyway. Most CD changers these days will play MP3's and a host of other formats...

I concur.

I was heartened to hear on NPR's "Fresh Air" that LP's are making somewhat of a comeback. I work with a young person who is "getting into vinyl". :)

I admit that I intend to digitally process some of the old vinyl I've collected over the years just to remove the pops and clicks that I was used to until I listened to CD's on a regular basis. Oh, and I will eliminate the hiss, too. But a lot of those analog transfers to CD's let the hiss come right along, so some of my CD's still have the hiss.

I think the "lack of life" might? be cured by a much higher sampling rate. True, information theory says that sampling at twice the highest frequency is all that is required, but music is complex waveforms made up of much higher harmonics than 44kHz that give it it's final color and tone.

That's interesting. I hadn't thought about sampling rate.

I prefer the 320k - 720k range of sample rate, sweet...

Is this an actual car that has been made and bought? I was under the impression from the article that it was a fanciful design. 300 pounds was the price, about. What's that lately? 600 thousand bucks US. Wonder how well it will hold its value, hate to think off the lot it goes to typical devaluation. I thought that Beretta made semi automatic shotguns? I think there are some sort of automatic shotguns. (Wikepedia visit called for now.) What happens? There is an attack and the driver throws Barack a Mossberg? Tires and windows sound good, I guess, though you sort of have to wonder if it isn't insulting to the President to have less control over the windows than a 3 year old. As far as CDs in this thing are concerned, well CD players could well be playing secret messages. Actually it is too bad the thing won't fly.

Maybe its an armored CD changer that carries CDs with titles like "Unbreakable: Backstreet Boys", "Invincible: Michael Jackson", and "Bulletproof: 50-Cent". These are all bands I'm pretty sure President Obama admitted to having a liking to.