Behold: Honeybee Cannon

[RedSkies]

This isn't a question or anything, but I thought you guys would find this interesting and all. Feel free to move the thread. It is certainly insect related.

I was wandering around on the internet today. I have no interest in beekeeping, I just kinda ended up on a beekeeping site. You know how it goes. You can start off looking for a roast beef recipe and end up looking at Cossack Slapdueling or something.

Apparently this guy claims that he worked on a top secret frozen bee launcher. You launch frozen bees into a trench or foxhole or whathaveyou. They then thaw and get all pissy, making the enemy soldiers run screaming...who subsequently get offed by your snipers. It appears to be serious. It's hard to believe, but I really, really hope it is. It is stuff like this that prove life is worth living.

(It just occured to me that I am listening to the Beatles "Let it Be" as I type this. How is that for kismet?)

EDIT forgot the link! http://www.beesource.com/pov/weapon.htm

 

[bugmankeith]

I dont know if bees can live after being frozen, but then again I dont know, i'm no beekeeper.

 

[dtknow]

Bees can indeed survive being chilled(not totally frozen). In studies which scientists put stickers on them they chill them to make them inactive and then put the stickers on. It must be a very specific temp as I tried it with one bee and killed it. I do bet that the flash freezing would work.

 

[dtknow]

On further thoughts...I think the weapon was more along the lines of a machine gun. I do wonder why they did not, say, pack the bees into a cardboard or similar box that could then be fired or catapulted into an enemy trench...just think...the box hits the ground, ruptures, and bees go everywhere.

 

[cacoseraph]

kinda like in the simpsons, the dogs that shoot bees out of their mouths!

 

[Ecilious]

kinda like in the simpsons, the dogs that shoot bees out of their mouths!

Yes! Genius! The world shall bee mine!

 

[Scarp172]

Sorry to burst your bubbles...

Well guys, while it may be possible to flash freeze, or at least chill the bees into submission and let them awaken upon warming up (pissed off if your lucky, but more likely dazed)- there are too many inconsistencies in this guy's story for me. If this was in WWII it might be believable, but in Vietnam it's highly unlikely- mostly due to the advances in technology, the climate, and environment, and the enemy themselves. Also the "officers showed up to my door" and "took me to a secret lab" "with all the equipment I wanted" are standard lines that fake veterans use routinely. The line "so they could be picked off by our snipers" is highly unlikely as well. Although some regular leg units would be lucky to get a team (one observer, one sniper) most leg units did not have snipers in them in the early part of the war. Certainly none of them had snipers just waiting around to pick off people running from bees.:wall: In the later part of the war scout sniper teams worked largely on their own. Please note that no one can verify his story either . Now on to logistics- keeping the bees at the correct temperature and carrying the firing mechanism (I can only assume pressurized air, as a powder load would disintegrate a bee body, and the pressurized air would need to be rather low pressure at any rate, reducing the range to around 50 yards or less) are just not feasable. To fire this thing effectively you'd have to be very close to your target and the target would need to be 1) almost naked, 2) not moving, or 3) scared of bees or bee stings. I have it on good authority (from the gentlemen of Project Delta) that the VC and NVA among others, were none of those three things 99/100 times! Also- how accurate do you think a bee fired from a smooth bore would be? Not very. One more point- there are far nastier things in Vietnam than bees and the NVA and VC have lived with them all their lives, many eating them as staple foods. But hey, when you've got guns and grenades and rockets, why would you want to throw bees anyway? If they are in a trench, foxhole, or spider hole, you can certainly get a grenade in there easier, faster, and more effectively than bees. I'd like to get some more information and send off an FOIA request for this guy too.
On a side note though, it's not as bizarre as some of the verified weapons that have been researched in the past: In WWII Britain built a battleship made completely out of ice (it lasted a whole year on its own, but never made it to battle), Hitler concocted a vortex gun that fired bursts of air to knock planes out of the sky (Used once in battle, it didnt work), and the USA developed the bat-bomb designed to send fruits bats with fire bombs on them to go burn Japanese cities (worked fantasticly- they burned down the test facility accidentally, unfortunately less than a week before the bombs were set to launch, the Atom bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so they never saw combat.) For more interesting weapons look up scorpion bombs, poison arrows, Hannibal's defense of his navy with snakes in pots, and tarantulas being catapulted over enemy walls.
Knowing is half the battle!
-Steve

 

[maxident213]

I saw a TV special about the bat-bomb, quite an idea they had there.