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“NYPD Pioneers New Dirty Bomb Detection System

By Tom Hays • Published July 29, 2011

The NYPD is testing ground-breaking counterterror technology expected to dramatically increase its ability to detect and thwart a potential radiation attack, officials said Thursday.

The technology will allow a command center in lower Manhattan to monitor 2,000 mobile radiation detectors carried by officers each day around the city. The detectors will send a wireless, real-time alert if there's a reading signaling a dirty bomb threat.

The system already is being tested under the watch of federal authorities in hopes it can be perfected and used elsewhere.

"This is the first and only place you'll see it," said Jessica Tisch, an NYPD counterterrorism official. "It's been tested in the field. It works, and we're hoping to get (the wireless detectors) deployed in a few months."

A dirty bomb — intended to spread panic by using a small explosive to create a radioactive cloud in urban settings — has never been discovered or detonated in a U.S. terror plot. But law enforcement considers dirty bombs a serious threat because they're easy to build and because of intelligence that foreign terrorists want to use them against American cities.

The radiation detection system is being developed as part of a $200 million lower Manhattan security initiative. Police say the overall plan was inspired by the so-called "ring of steel" encircling the business district in London but is broader in scope and sophistication.

The initiative will rely largely on 3,000 closed-circuit security cameras carpeting the roughly 1.7 square miles south of Canal Street, the subway system and parts of midtown Manhattan. So far, about 1,800 cameras are up and running, with the rest expected to come on line by the end of the year.

In 2008, police began monitoring live feeds from the cameras round-the-clock at a high-tech command center in lower Manhattan, home to Wall Street, the new development at ground zero, and other sites needing heightened protection.

"We're talking about some of the most significant targets anywhere in the world," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Thursday.

The NYPD is using a single, high-bandwidth fiber optic network to connect all its cameras to a central computer system. It's also pioneering "video analytic" computer software designed to detect threats, like unattended bags, and retrieve stored images based on descriptions of terror or other criminal suspects.

Copyright AP - Associated Press“

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/nypd-security-counterterror-radiation-dirty-bomb/2123455/?amp=1

“What Does The Machine Do?



Batman’s machine that operated on Fox’s concept of SONAR. (Photo Credit: The Dark Knight (film) / Warner Bros. Pictures)
Well… yes. Consider the triangulation machine Bruce Wayne developed to find out where the Joker was hiding by turning “every cell phone in Gotham into a microphone”. To understand what the machine does, let’s rewind to Fox’s meeting in Hong Kong, where he deliberately leaves behind a modified cell phone in a drawer in the building’s reception.

The device, which is another R&D project, sends out “a high-frequency pulse and records the response time for mapping an environment.” Wayne immediately realizes that it relies on SONAR, suggesting “it works like a –”… “A submarine, Mr. Wayne, like a submarine” interrupts Fox.

Is this technology realistic or is it just CSI-esque hogwash masquerading under technical jargon? Let’s first try to understand how the machine might work.



A representation of how SONAR works.

SONAR is a technology that uses ultra high-frequency sound waves to calculate the location of an object. A submarine sends these pulses in an object’s direction and determines its location by calculating the time taken by the pulse to be reflected and received by its receivers. Bats and dolphins also voice similar pulses and use echolocation to draw a map of their environment. Bats… of course!

So, basically, Bruce Wayne implemented echolocation by converting every cell phone into a high-frequency generator and developed a detailed map of the city. This is clear when Fox looks at the violent blue ripples on the grid of screens and wanly says “you took my SONAR concept and applied it to every phone in the city. Half the city feeding you SONAR, you can image all of Gotham.” Batman can now find the Joker using this map when he speaks anywhere “within the range of a cell phone”.

However, Fox despairingly calls it “unethical” and “dangerous” for the abuse of liberty and consent it entails. The Joker’s guile has forced even one of the most scrupulous of men to break the rules. Yet, of course, the good guys in Hollywood are forgiven, since their violations are always well intended, always for the sake of the greater good (sigh).“

https://www.scienceabc.com/humans/movies/how-scientifically-accurate-is-batmans-sonar-machine-in-the-dark-knight.html