In what needs to be among the funniest and likewise creepiest military videos in a long time, a Mk 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapon System (CIWS) is seen drawing a bead on a 737 passing over what seems a Harpers Ferry or Whidbey Island class amphibious dock landing ship. Sailors close-by laugh as they inform the sinister-looking Phalanx “no… No… NO!” as if it’s a dog ready to do something it should not prior to it drops its barrel and forgets the juicy target passing overhead.
Check out the viral video here:
The Mk 15 Phalanx is no complete stranger to personification. There have actually been limitless jokes about its look and twitchy character. From R2D2 to Frosty to an excited Minion, Phalanx and its land-based cousin, Centurion, have actually brought some smiles.
As for any threat to the 737, which might have been a Navy P-8 Poseidon, although the markings do not look that method, we simply do not understand for sure. Regardless, there should not have actually been any genuine danger at all. The system has different modes, from completely manual, to semi-automatic where it requires approval to fire, to completely automated mode. The latter of which permits it to engage targets as it chooses in really particular battle scenarios.
The Mk 15 has actually been gradually updated over its years of service and, in the majority of setups, it now includes a host of electro-optical electronic cameras to help aesthetically recognize targets prior to shooting on them and to utilize the Phalanx’s 20mm cannon by hand versus little boats and other lower-end risks.
Still, that does not suggest it isn’t exceptionally weird enjoying that Vulcan cannon slewing sinisterly on an unlucky 737 overhead.
Thank goodness its masters existed to verbally command CIWS to ‘let it go.’
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