January 6, 2008:
The U.S. Army has
bought nine additional Eagle Eye surveillance tower systems for Iraq, at a cost
of $556,000 each. This is a security system of day/night cameras, laser range
finder and designator, all mounted on a
truck mounted tower, which has evolved in the last four years. This system has gotten more mobile, and seen
its tower grow taller. The current Eagle Eye tower is 107 feet tall, allowing
the cameras to spot vehicles up to 25 kilometers away. Great for keeping an eye
on thinly populated areas in a desert, which western Iraq has plenty of. The
earlier 30 foot tower can see out to eleven kilometers, the 60 foot tower out
to 16 kilometers and 84 foot tower out to 20 kilometers. The 30 foot tower was
adequate for most situations, which usually involved guarding a base, but the
taller tower also serves as a communications relay for widely dispersed troops.
The towers can be easily taken apart or erected by troops. When temporary bases
are set up, an Eagle Eye tower provides the equivalent of a permanent UAV
presence, which, just by being there, tends to discourage attacks, or any
misbehavior in the vicinity of the base.
Eagle Eye is part of the RAID system.
Four years ago, the U.S. Army sent 22 blimps (aerostats, actually) to Iraq and
Afghanistan. These RAID (Rapid Aerostat Initial Deployment) blimps float at
about a thousand feet up, tethered by a cable that provides power and
communications to the day and night cameras up there. The big problem is ground
fire from rifles and machine-guns. Iraqis, in particular, like using the RAID
blimps as targets. Rifle fire won't destroy the blimps, but does cause them to
be brought down more frequently for repairs. Normally, the blimps can stay up
for 30 days at a time, but the bullet hole repairs have some of them coming
down every few days. There are surveillance systems similar to RAID, but
mounted on tall steel towers. These also suffer gunfire damage, but rarely any
that damage the equipment. It was soon found that tower mounted cameras were
just as good as the aerostats, in most situation, and much cheaper.
