Re: [DS] Minefield clearing pondering

G'day Jay,

 >As for the mines mentioned in the article,
 >I'd bet they're discussing a type
 >of mine that physically moves itself
 >every so often to attempt to thwart
 >more persistent forms of mine clearance.

Yep, based on grasshoppers. They are (or were said to be) in the
conceptual 
stage at present, but they're aiming for a minefield that can reorg
itself 
in under 10 secs. Basically as they can't use anti-personnel mines
anymore 
the US were after tank mines that wouldn't allow infantry to clear them 
easily now the "protective outer-ring" anti-personnel had been removed.
The 
article gave the impression that the designers believed that would be 
impossible to clear, it just started me pondering other possibilities
(with 
no background/knowledge I wasn't sure whether the methods actually
already 
existed or not though).

 >Do you have a URL for this article, or was it hard copy?

Mine was a hardcopy from a recent New Scientist and if you're not 
subscribed you won't be able to access it on their site. I've got a copy
of 
the webpage if anyone is interested though.

Cheers

Beth

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Elizabeth Fulton
c/o CSIRO Division of Marine Research
GPO Box 1538
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email: beth.fulton@marine.csiro.au