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The Military Technology Politics

Jet-Powered Flyboard Soars Over Paris For Bastille Day Parade (theguardian.com) 127

Posted by BeauHD from the French-James-Bond dept.
New submitter HansiMeier33 shares a report from The Guardian: France's annual Bastille Day parade showcased European military cooperation and innovation on Sunday, complete with a French inventor hovering above Paris on a jet-powered flyboard. The former jetskiing champion and military reservist Franky Zapata clutched a rifle as he soared above the Champs-Elysees on his futuristic machine, which the French military helped to develop. The board, which was first created to fly above water, can reach speeds of up to 190km/h and can run for 10 minutes. The French armed forces minister, Florence Parly, said before the parade that the flyboard could "allow tests for different kinds of uses, for example as a flying logistical platform or, indeed, as an assault platform."
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Jet-Powered Flyboard Soars Over Paris For Bastille Day Parade More

Jet-Powered Flyboard Soars Over Paris For Bastille Day Parade

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  • Nothing? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jimtheowl ( 4200185 ) on Monday July 15, 2019 @09:06PM (#58931882)
    If this had happened in the USA, there would be a lot more said here.
    • Yes, I'm wondering where the flood of outrage at the fascism is going to start. The man was holding a GUN! We know for a fact that makes people feel uncomfortable and unsafe.

    • Re:Nothing? (Score:5, Informative)

      by NewtonsLaw ( 409638 ) on Monday July 15, 2019 @09:31PM (#58931980)

      It *has* been done in the USA. Back in the 1960s, Hiller created the flying platform which was touted also as a one-man flying reconnaisance/observation and assault platform.

      Then, in the 1980s (or maybe the 1990s) there was the XJet, a turbine-powered flying platform that promised the same kind of functionality.

      Suffice to say... *NONE* of these ever saw the light of day as an actual product due to a number of problems:

      1. too expensive (grunts don't warrant a big-spend in military terms)
      2. too risky (no safe "failure mode")
      3. too vulnerable (you're a sitting duck up there in the sky)

      For these (and other) reasons, I don't expect to see this French craft gracing the skies over our heads any time at all.

      • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward

        No it has not, not like this.

        Of course, the state of technology has everything to do with it, but watch how this thing responds to the person flying it, and how well he controls the platform.

        As another post, who gets it, said ""That was an amazing sight".

    • If this had happened in the USA, there would be a lot more said here.

      Actually, strapping on mini engines and flying around like a drunken Superman isn't really anything new. Jet pack flight has actually been around since 1961 [smithsonianchannel.com]. There are also hobbyists who do one-man-flights with a rig called a paramotor [youtube.com], which isn't as cool looking but costs significantly less and has a much longer flight time.

      The really funny thing is that in the USA, there is no pilot license required to fly an ultralight aircraft [faa.gov]. I'm guessing the reason it's not more common is the expenses involved in

      • Re:Nothing? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by NewtonsLaw ( 409638 ) on Monday July 15, 2019 @10:48PM (#58932172)

        Yeah, how crazy is the FAA...???

        You can fly an ultralite aircraft with no registration, no training, no licensing.... but if you build a tiny (251g) model of the same craft you have to register yourself, put your registration number on the model and (soon) sit a competency exam before you're allowed to fly it.

        Now tell me something isn't seriously screwed with the US aviation administration!

        • Owners of ultralights haven't been complete cunts in public like small aircraft owners have been.

        • No, not crazy -- it makes good sense, from a risk management perspective. To weaponize your ultralight, you must be willing to die for your cause. That willingness is rare in America; the probability of an ultralight as an attack vector is too low to justify the cost of defending against it. Weaponizing a scale model of that ultralight, otoh, has no such barrier. The only risk to the attacker is the cost of the model, which is no barrier at all. All the authorities can do is make it harder to remain a

        • well, you see, drone owners, referred to by another ocmmenter as 'complete cunts' have flown into managed airspace, taken pictures through windows of women/children, and in general tried to be as annoying as possible with their little toys without regard for anyone else or for any level of safety. So, FAA regulates the shit out of them to try to cut down on this assholish behavior. Ultralight pilots do not behave like that... and FYI, if you buy an ultralight, USUALLY, though the FAA does not require it,

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by q4Fry ( 1322209 )

            Well there was that crazy postman who flew to the Capitol building in the heart of the biggest restricted airspace radius in the country to "deliver mail" to Congress.

      • Re:Nothing? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by hey! ( 33014 ) on Tuesday July 16, 2019 @07:59AM (#58933340) Homepage Journal

        The Bell Rocket Belt had a flight time of 21 seconds. This device has a flight time of 10 minutes. It's a lot easier to imagine uses for ten minutes of flight time that it is for twenty-one seconds.

        The real problem here is finding a use case scenario for such an aircraft that wouldn't be better served by an equivalent drone not burdened by the weight of the pilot. Can you imagine trying to shoot at something while flying the thing?

        About the only thing I can think of is infiltration tactics, moving lightly armed ground troops around and behind enemy strong points.

        • The real problem here is finding a use case scenario for such an aircraft that wouldn't be better served by an equivalent drone not burdened by the weight of the pilot. Can you imagine trying to shoot at something while flying the thing?

          About the only thing I can think of is infiltration tactics, moving lightly armed ground troops around and behind enemy strong points.

          Seems like strapping a gun to a quadcoptor could achieve 95% of what this guy could for 5% the cost.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Wulf2k ( 4703573 )

          Military uses? Eh, I'm sure they exist, but whatever.

          But how awesome would this be as an emergency escape from a top floor of a building? Have it programmed to fly back up when its passenger disembarks, you could get a lot of people out of a flaming building with 10 minutes of flight time.

    • Well ... the advocates of privacy and human rights start to look more and more like Takeshi Kovacs' enemies ... they talk about military tek but in essence it will be crowd control. The gillets jaunes as stated spread like wildfire when they booted. Workers rights are being set back, ultra-right is on the rise. Last elections here in the hinterland the ultra-nationalists got to about 19% i think from somewhere around 6 ... A lot of mericans seem to mis-understand this "union" thing , its nothing alike the s

  • Flyboard (Score:4, Interesting)

    by tquasar ( 1405457 ) on Monday July 15, 2019 @09:22PM (#58931950)
    That was an amazing sight. The Flyboard could have uses other than military like search and rescue but if it becomes available to the public there will be noise and privacy issues. What else could happen?

    • What else could happen?

      I'm thinking mishaps involving gravity...

    • Similar devices are already available to the public. There is just one problem - you can now flyblike superman, but without the invincibility. Considering you can accelerate at nearly 3g if you nosedive, it's possible to go from wicked to wrekd in about 0.7 seconds.

    • Put two of them together with a carbon fiber bike chassis and wheels that weigh less than 150 lb with a thrust redirecter mechanism you could have a nice flying motorcycle. Probably four of them with a lightweight custom chassis could make a nice flying car.

      Too bad its insanely loud and will be banned from most cities and town in 5 seconds.

      The noise problem needs to be fixed or it wont take off.

      • The noise problem needs to be fixed or it wont take off.

        So the jets are right out then. Could try a big fan but thats still pretty loud and already been done.

    • Him flying on that thing, it is just amazing.

      All these comments about how impractical it are, they are true, but off the mark. Sure, it would be nice if this were somehow some practical mode of conveyance, which it's not for lots of reasons, so what?

      What it is, is an amazing stunt! If it were in a movie, it would be done with special effects.

    • The Flyboard could have uses other than military like search and rescue

      As long as the whoever needs help isn't more than 10 minutes away, or need picking up, or any kind of equipment, sure, it'll work wonders

  • Note to self, look into hover-tanks for next July 4.

  • I can't believe the levels one needs to go to in order to avoid the Paris protestors these days!

  • at the end there was mention of the announcement of French equivalent to Space Force

    We must be more vigilant against the threat Space poses to us, whatever lurks up there can't be good

  • See Gizmodo. https://gizmodo.com/french-inv... [gizmodo.com]
  • Or as I call "Welcome to Disney's wonderful world of no OHSA.

  • make the board 10 feet long, full of fuel, and painted shiny silver, with a matching suit, sponsored by Marvel..

  • I saw a video of this, and had a concern.

    Maybe this isn't even a valid concern, since the hoverboard controls are in one hand all you can do is fire a rife Rambo style screaming into the void and hope you hit something. So maybe a hovertrooper is just there to inspire awe and not really to fire a weapon.

    But, it seems like if you were to open fire, the moment you lit up your machine gun the fairly powerful recoil would knock you backwards, either turning you upside-down (!) on the hoverboard, or sending you

    • A normal rifle doesn't have that much recoil if you fire in bursts. Can't do a tactical stance leaning forward on that thing, but firing while standing up straight is perfectly fine, and the platform will probably move backward just a little bit. With practice, I imagine the shooter can compensate by leaning forward a little, directing some of the thrust backwards.

      It's not very practical though: up there you will be extremely visible, with no cover and presenting the maximum cross section of your body

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by necro81 ( 917438 )

      But, it seems like if you were to open fire, the moment you lit up your machine gun the fairly powerful recoil would knock you backwards

      With proper control algorithms, that could be accounted for and reacted to. What helps is that the (rotational) moment of inertia for this whole system is substantial, and the recoil from one or several shots isn't going to immediately accelerate that system.

      For context, here is a video of a man [youtu.be] in a balancing wheelchair [mobiusmobility.com] (the Segway was a spinoff of this technology) f

    • your average rifle doesn't have much recoil. even so it wouldn't be worse than turbulence etc which would already have to be well and truly catered for.
  • Ahh France, where they celebrate conquering themselves!
  • The French must love retro tech.

  • You just have to question humanity, when a key feature of this ridiculously cool craft is that the person on it has a gun.

    FFS, why do so few question this? - it enshrines the purpose of this craft is purely military, rather than any good it may do, or just the sheer coolness of it.

    It's a moot point from a military perspective anyway, the person on it is a sitting duck.

    This world is screwed.

  • Never thought I'd see the day when the US is outraged over a show of military patriotism, while the French blow money on military jet-skateboarders with a machine-gun, flanked by a full regalia of unnecessary pageantry and no one bats an eye.

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