Do you think this has been done?

I was looking at footage of the US Military in Iraq and how it seemed to me that the majority of successfull attacks were from planted explosives.

So I was thinking how you would go about preventing this type of attack.

So I figured I would have to make a sensor obviously, there is no other possible way besides espionage and figuring out where they plant them from human intelligence sources.

So then I went about trying to figure out a basic concept of what kind of sensor would be the most effective.

Then I started to learn about something called atomic spectrum. Atomic spectrum is basically everything has an electromagnetic frequency and that in controlled experiments they can figure out what something's atomic spectrum looks like, or an elements fingerprint so to speak..

So I figured this is a good basic concept at making a sensor that could detect all kinds of explosives.

The concept is that you have something that can emit a wide array of electromagnetic frequencies and beam them into a specific spot. Then you have a "receiver" that can pick up the elctromagnetic waves again as they bounce back. The waves that are picked up somehow could be analyzed by a computer and be used to determine the chemical composition of the Earth that it was pointed at in cross sections.

So if there was a IED the sensor would know that the atomic spectrum of that aprticualr piece of earth was characteristic to a known explosive, and explosives could be detected like this.


So what does everyone think? Been done before? Not been done before?



To me it seems like the best approach.

So are we not that advanced yet? Or is this elementary and all the IED attacks I see in video and hear about on the news are "not reality".





[edit on 9-2-2005 by Ritual]

The most devastating IED attacks in iraq have come from Artillery shells buried in the ground by the side of the road.

why not use a magnetic anomoly detector like submarine hunting aircraft??? or even... a metal detector mounted in a low / slow flying uav??

Or heres an idea. go to South Africa and buy loads of their troop carring lorries that are about 6 feet off the floor to counter mines??

Because most explosives dont need to be encased to get the job done.

Yeah I seen those artillery shells they use. I dont know even how a metal detector works. But a metal detctor would only be good at finding these buried artillerys hells.

What if they just used straight explosive buried with some kind of thin metal wire to detonate remotely. might not potentially have the force a shell would exploding, but would still blow up.

They could be using some type of metal like ceramic or something plastic. Not very magnetized like metal. Or something to make it invisible to the standard metal detector.

Those mine resistant APC's will do jack all at stopping a mine. And especially wont stop an IED.

[edit on 9-2-2005 by Ritual]

[edit on 9-2-2005 by Ritual]

Whatever im sure it would take me like years of math crunching and concepts to even figure it all out, I was just wondering if these types of things are real already.

If not then I would like to donate my life to figuring it out. Where can I sign up?

Originally posted by Ritual
Whatever im sure it would take me like years of math crunching and concepts to even figure it all out, I was just wondering if these types of things are real already.

If not then I would like to donate my life to figuring it out. Where can I sign up?

I doubt the idea you mentioned would work. Basically, even if you could detect the RF emissions of atoms from a distance - they are affected greatly by the doppler effect (due to heat/vibration) thus making this type of detector difficult to use oustide of a controlled environment. Also, chemical explosives are made primarily of common elements - so there is little unique stuff to pick up.

There are detectors than can detect specific vapors emitted by chemical explosives. These are available in both electronic form, as well as cloths impregnated with chemicals that react to those vapors (commonly used at airports). The problem with current detectors is that they are only effective in close ranges (when the enemy could already have blow you up).

There is a great deal of research going on at various national labratories/universities/coorperations to build a better device. If you are interesting in doing this kind of thing for a living, I would suggest getting a chemistry/physics/engineering degree and go job hunting.

I understand the complexity of it, I know that even if I was tasked in trying to figure it out, or tasked myself to try and figure it out, it would take me a long time.

But I can picture it working in my mind at least.

Honestly im in my young 20's. I didnt goto college, I stuck with the girlfriend and living at home thing. As far as a University, how the hell would I pay for college?

And more importantly, would I even pass? In high school I skipped every single class besides phys ed and science, the two classes my girlfriend were in.

I would goto the library and read. I must of read 1000s of books. Noone really cared honestly and I was the exception and they still passed me if I did like 1 project for every class. They all said I was smart, in fact most people I meet tell me I am really smart. Someone who got his high school diploma as a gift and never really attended high school much, I sure get alot of compliments on my intelligence.

I think my personality conflicts with school.

In math class I would just get into arguments.

Science class was cool but the funnest things were talking about science rather then learning about it. I dont think there is that much to learn to catch up with what everyone else knows honestly. I mean big deal you can remember the periodic table or you know how to find the mole or whatever.

I beleive in specialized knowledge. Me going to college = me not learning anything. Ill put my mind to whatever I want to get done, and learn everythng on the way there. Not flooding my mind with things I likely will never use in my life, or could even be proven false.

Like my math teacher telling me that you can somehow subtract, add. multiply, or divide negative numbers and get a positive. WTH. If you have something negative and you mathematize it with something else that is negative, you cant ever get a positive.

So that is about the degree of what I think about college and all of that junk. Why do I need to learn US history to figure out how to make a bomb detector? if anything it slows me down from the ultimate goal.


/Rant off

Sign me up for bomb detector school though.