Many of the functions of modern weapons are provided by electronics. Detection and tracking of targets, exit to a firing position - a person can only press a button. But robots can get mad, shooting everything that gets in their way. And this is already happening.
The armed forces of South Africa faced an unpleasant incident, reminiscent of the plot of the old gloomy cartoon "Polygon", in which a tank equipped with the latest technology killed a lot of people. In life, everything happened about the same: during the exercise, an unknown reason "prompted" an automatic air defense gun to shoot 9 soldiers and seriously injure 14 more.
Brigadier General Kwena Mangope, a spokesman for the South African army, has so far only said that the cause of the failure remains unidentified: "The problem may have been mechanical, causing a fully loaded cannon to open uncontrolled fire, killing and maiming people." Some other experts suggest that the error was caused by the computer. According to weapons specialist Helmoed-Römer Heitman, in this case, it will not be possible to establish the exact cause of the tragedy at all.
The main "defendant in the case" is the Swiss-German anti-aircraft gun Oerlikon GDF-005. Equipped with passive and active radars and a laser targeting system, it is capable of firing at low-flying, fast targets, including aircraft, helicopters, UAVs and cruise missiles. In automatic mode, a pair of 35-mm barrels and a recharging system are used.
During the exercise, the gun "got out of control" several times, and as a result, it had to be fixed by hand, with the help of metal fasteners and a cable. However, at some point, the fasteners could not stand it, and the barrels began to scatter shells to the right and left. An unnamed female officer at the risk of her life tried to stop him, but Oerlikon only calmed down when he completely fired on both of his stores - and each of them contains 250 half-kilogram shells.
All this looks rather depressing, especially against the background of more and more messages about the introduction of the next combat robot into operation.
