When I approached the Recon Robotics booth at the annual Mock Riot in West Virginia last week to see the dumbell-shaped "Throw Bot" in action, David Gustafson told me to check back later -- the bot needed charging. Half an hour later it was still charging. And a half hour after that. Finally, the little drone was ready, and Gustafson tossed it across the room for a quick demo.
One Danger Room reader isn't surprised at this delay. "We had six of these in the Al-Anbar province," he reports. "Battery life wasn't too good -- we never used them."
Now, those were development models. Another reader says the current production models are much more robust. But maybe Gustafson is being a tad optimistic when he predicts orders totalling 20,000 Throw Bots from the U.S. Army in Iraq.
See the bot in action below:
--David Axe, cross-posted at War Is Boring
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