Drones have been all over the news this year and last as people debate over how easily they should be made available to average consumers for purchase or use. They make incredible hobby devices as well as a great source for aerial video. Great for kids and adults alike. However, you will always have someone looking to ruin the fun for all by using it for purposes that are deemed invasive, dangerous or illegal.
Thankfully drones aren’t banned and they never will be (hopefully…this is the land of the free right?). They are however well-restricted in various circumstances and soon to be even more so as the US government pushes to require registration.
Now the question is, how do we deal with them when people are caught doing things they shouldn’t be doing? People have found themselves equally in trouble for their acts of taking these aerial devices out of the sky. From throwing their shirts at them to shooting at them with shotguns or other weapons that can cause a lot of harm to those nearby, these folks have found themselves being prosecuted by the authorities or sued by the drone owners. So what is a politically correct method of taking them down without harming the device or anyone in the area?
A nonprofit R&D company in Ohio known as Drones has developed an answer. This answer is in the form of what looks like a rifle with some kind of crazy WiFi antenna sticking out of the front. The rifle is referred to as the “DroneDefender” and it uses targeted radio waves to neutralize and remove the drone from the skies. It is effective up to 1300 feet in distance and currently immune to all laws or restrictions for what it is used for.
Battelle demonstrates the DroneDefender in the following video, showing how easy it is to use and how quickly it gets the job done.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX4XXLb_Vuw
