Air Force testing a friggin' laser

OK, this is pretty damned cool ...

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/08/will-new-laser.html

 

A seventh-grader with a laser pointer can take down a 747.

 

May in fact have happened off the coast of Long Island 12 years ago last month.

Or it was shot out of the sky. One or the other.

 

Somehow, when Abdul the Terrorist gets turned into a pile of ash, I'm thinking the plausible denials will be hard to swallow.
Still cool stuff though. I remember seeing one of those futureweapons shows a couple years ago where they were talking about a similar system that would be used to shoot down ballistic missiles. Kind of a roving, earth-based SDI system. I would assume this was adapted from that?

 

It took a Real Genius to think of this.

 

This guy was doing it back in the 80s. EDIT: Beat me to it!

 

You don't believe in spontaneous human combustion?

 

I don't know if I should be impressed, scared, or both.

 

No. But I do believe in Bigfoot. He, John McCain and George Bush shot down that TWA flight with one of these laser doohickies.
[double crossthread]