When it comes to submarines, stealth is no longer an excuse for being anti-social. A 40-inch-long buoy may soon allow submarine captains to send text messages from under the sea. After leaving the submarine's trash chute, the buoy stays tethered to the vessel by miles of cables, LiveScience reports. Once sailors have texted to their hearts' content, they can cut the buoy loose. Alternatively, Lockheed Martin, the system's designer, also pictures buoys dropped from airplanes, which could receive submarine messages via an "acoustic messaging system" that resembles sonar and send them along in text message form. By air or by garbage disposal, the buoys would improve current submarine communications, Rod Reints at Lockheed Martin toldLiveScience.
“Currently, they have to go up to near periscope depth to communicate . . . . They become more vulnerable to attack as they get closer to the surface. Ultimately, we’re trying to increase the communication availability of the sailors while increasing their safety."
If successful, one could only imagine the buoy's other applications. Underwater robots, for example, could text us live updates about sunken vessels or oil leaks. Also, given that we can now text in caves and tweet in space, the buoy, by allowing people to text from miles under water, means that there is nowhere lft 2 escape. Related content: Discoblog: Submarine Sonar is Confusing Whales, British Military Says Discoblog: Woman Receives First Ever PhD in Texting Discoblog: Watch Those Thumbs Go! Champion Texter Wins $50,000 Discoblog: The New Defense Against Despotism: Text Messaging Discoblog: Astronauts in Space Finally Enter the Intertubes
Image: U.S. Navy
