No one has withstood the pain it produces for more than three seconds. People who volunteered to stand in front of the directed energy beam say they felt as if they were on fire. When they stepped aside, the pain disappeared instantly.
When the beam hits an individual, it penetrates 1/64th of an inch beneath the skin and heats water molecules to 130 degrees in less than a second. "It tricks the pain sensors into thinking they're on fire."
Susan Levine, the Pentagon's project manager for the energy beam, said years of tests on humans and animals enabled researchers to establish a margin of safety. After several seconds, the device automatically shuts off to avoid burning its target, she said.
Karcher said the Active Denial System "is absolutely not designed or intended or built" to be a torture device. "To use this as any sort of torture device would be in direct violation of" the Pentagon's definition of nonlethal weapons, he said. "Nor, as professionals, would any of us sign up for it."
coming soon to a Free Speech Zone near you!
what the well-dressed Cenobite is wearing this season
"A model in a chainmail-type bodysuit poses on the catwalk during fashion designer Alexander McQueen's 'Black' Fashion Show at Earls Court Exhibition Centre in London, Thursday, June 3, 2004. (AP Photo/PA, Myung-Jung Kim)"
do you prefer the puppet on the left, or the puppet on the right?
"In an interview set for broadcast Sunday on C-SPAN, presidential hopeful John Kerry says he supports the current FCC crackdown on television indecency."
Bush, Kerry Take Same Approach on Iraq:
"Analysts say the growing political echo chamber is largely a result of the limited options facing the United States in a country teetering dangerously close to mayhem. 'There aren't very many good solutions out there,' said Stephen Hess, an analyst at the Brookings Institution. 'Cutting and running is probably the worst, so that limits your choices.'"
Bulldozer Rampage!
A 52-year-old welder nursing a grudge against the town fathers and driving a bulldozer converted into a war machine ripped the heart of this high-country ranching town from its foundations Friday.
Among the structures destroyed or heavily damaged in a relentless 90-minute rampage were Granby's town hall and library, a bank, the town's newspaper, an electric cooperative building, Gambles Store, an excavating business and a house owned by the town's former mayor, as well as a concrete plant adjacent to the business of the man believed responsible for the bizarre assault.
Police fired away during the frenzy of destruction, to no avail.
"He's put armored plates all around it and it's impenetrable," said business owner Terri Hertel, her voice trembling as gunfire rattled in the background. "Armor-piercing bullets won't go through it. He's destroying the town of Granby."
All the buildings had a connection to a heated 2000 zoning dispute, which involved the rezoning of land adjacent to the muffler shop of Marvin John Heemeyer, the man authorities identified as responsible for the devastation.
During Heemeyer's nightmarish attack, he shot repeatedly at a number of huge propane tanks at a distributorship with a .50-caliber weapon, authorities said. The apparent attempt to trigger a massive explosion failed.
The episode came to an end about 4:30 p.m. Friday, when Heemeyer's self-styled assault vehicle came to a halt in the attack on Gambles Store and was cornered by emergency responders driving a road grader.
It was not immediately known if Heemeyer was still alive inside the vehicle. Unofficial reports said he had welded the vehicle's door shut.
Jim Holahan, director of emergency services for Grand County, said at one point deputies from the sheriff's special response team were on top of the 53.8-ton Caterpillar D9 Bulldozer, firing at Heemeyer through its jury-rigged viewport. [...]
