back to article Police ROBOT attacks and BURNS DOWN HOUSE

A mobile home in Tennessee was left a smoking ruin last month after it was attacked by a heavily armed police robot firing advanced triple-warhead gas grenades. Despite the uncompromising tactics employed by the no-nonsense tin cop, and the fact that satellite and heat-sensing technology had apparently confirmed that the …

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  1. NoneSuch Silver badge
    Terminator

    and so...

    ...Skynet begins it relentless assault on the human race.

    1. Keep Refrigerated

      OCP stock rises...

      "You have 30 seconds to comply..."pp

  2. IanML
    Mushroom

    Please put down your weapon. You have 20 seconds to comply.

    Four... three... two... one... I am now authorized to use physical force!

  3. 4HiMarks
    Flame

    ROTM

    Surely this should be filed under it?

    Flames because, well duh!

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Terminator

    "a javelin of flames into the living room"

    those fly-on-the-wall police video shows are going to get a whole lot more watchable...

  5. @dartacus

    I should know better than this, but:

    Klaatu - barada YOU'RE NICKED -o!

    G

    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_The_Earth_Stood_Still#Cultural_influence)

  6. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Cowardly Cops strike via proxy

    Need cops with courage...

    Naw, just send in the robot and nuke 'em into the stone age.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    IGMC

    Am I the only one that finished reading the headline and mentally added "WITH LEMONS!"?

    1. Dan Beshear
      Facepalm

      Why yes

      Yes, you are.

    2. Abremms

      nope

      I was right there with you. my next thought was "Who gave the robots combustable lemons? damn you Aperture!"

      1. lpopman
        Happy

        titular announcement

        BURN THEM! BURN THEM ALL!

    3. Rick Brasche
      Flame

      nope

      nope. I read it in Cave Johnson's voice too.

      but I do wonder, how they can determine that the fire was started by the robot system and not by the psycho they were after?

  8. Dave Murray
    Flame

    A mobile home in Tennessee

    You mean a trailer?

    1. Kirbini
      FAIL

      Reading comprehension much?

      You mean, like a the doublewide mentioned in TFA?

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Too much taxpayer's money to burn

    From the manuf website: "The Triple-Chaser® is a fast burning pyrotechnic grenade designed for crowd management. "

    Fast burning? Interior use? The plods must have developed a new meaning for the word 'management'.

    1. Peter Simpson 1
      FAIL

      Triple Chaser/Triple Chanber?

      Easy mistake to make, they simply pressed the wrong button...

      //where's the grenade icon when you need it?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      More worrying

      In a supposed democracy that the police should have such robots and ordanance to 'control crowds'. This is the sort of thing a police state employs to subdue the citizens and prevent them fighting back against the gross abuses of the ruling class. But then I guess we have exactly the same in the UK and most of Europe - in fact, I would guess that a look at the police and their ability to muster deadly force the police of all these supposedly 'free' and 'democratic' countries muster far more deadly force for use on their own people than their military can muster to protect those same people (certainly that is the case in the UK).

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Big Brother

        Police don't believe in Freedom

        As far as the police in this country are concerned, people are no law abiding citizens anymore, but problems that need to be controlled or managed, hence the general "us and them" attitude and demeanour. The police are no longer part of the community, they want to CONTROL the community and so they dress up like paramilitaries and are armed to the teeth with an assortment of "non-lethal" weapons that can easily be used in ways that become lethal (Ian Tomlinson anyone?)

  10. I know better
    Thumb Up

    Welcome!

    I for one welcome our new fire-breathing robot overlords

  11. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    wait until they burn up a family with this

    I can't wait to see those headlines.

  12. asiaseen

    fast burning pyrotechnic grenade designed for crowd management

    Presumably of oven-ready people.

  13. anarchic-teapot
    Mushroom

    Can have have one?

    I've got 2 years' unpaid child allowance to recover and no idea how I'll feed the kids this month.

    ...

    Hey, where'd the hand-grenade icon go? You'll have to settle for the Tex-Mex icon instead then.

    1. alwarming
      WTF?

      Re: where'd the hand-grenade icon go ?

      Also: Why does it say "we are sorry you didn't like this post" when I downvote one.

      I would imagine moderatrix (or El Reg) being glad that moronic commentards are quibbling amongst themselves ?

      PS: I didn't downvote any post on this article - it's a general question.

  14. Will Godfrey Silver badge

    Where's Nero when you need hem?

    See title

    1. Elmer Phud
      Coat

      Nero?

      Nero is now a FIFA official, he's given up the evil cackling and pyromania but still loves the fiddle.

  15. Martin Usher
    FAIL

    We have to destroy in order to save

    The Los Angles police department recently tried a novel approach to a barricade situation in a residential area. Having spent a small fortune on a remote control loader (one of those combination fork lift / bucket truck things) for their bomb squad they brought this in and proceeded to tear the back off the house 'in order to get a better look'. They took out substantial chunks of the neighbors houses while they were about it -- obviously this was a bit more tricky to drive than a R/C toy. Having located and killed the suspect ("looking at me in a funny way" is usually grounds for being shot in the LA area)(the sheriff's department is notorious for this) they then went into damage control mode (CYA damage control; I guess the homeowners were left to pick up the pieces as best they can).

    Why do we give people these toys? Whenever I see heavily armed security people I feel uncomfortable because I know that the most likely thing they'll do in an emergency is panic, shoot anything that moves and then cook up some fantastic tale about how they felt in fear of their lives.

  16. zen1

    I demand

    Playmobile, monster trucks, pork rindes, more explosions, chicken wings and more scantily clad women!

  17. Martin Budden Silver badge
    Alien

    Mr

    GPS: probably not a "tracking device", probably just the cops checking the location of his mobile phone (sorry, 'cellphone') in order to determine his likely location. On arrival at the GPS coordinates they found a trailer home, used a heat sensor to identify a hot-spot in the trailer, and decided that he was in there.

    Of course he may not have actually been there at the time, it could be that he'd left his phone inside and there was a hot area from an oven/heater/whatever. So maybe he didn't even need to escape the mayhem.

    p.s. "extraterrestrial explanation" icon: GPS, innit.

  18. veti Silver badge
    Flame

    Collateral damage?

    So... the suspect's presence was confirmed by "heat-sensor" technology, suggesting that someone was inside the trailer...

    Has anyone bothered asking who it was?

    1. asiaseen

      Has anyone bothered asking who it was?

      Don't be silly, it doesn't matter.

    2. Dave 15

      why bother

      It doesn't really matter, a few more dead people just means a little more cover up to do.

      The American police are on a par here with the British ones - who time and again are judged to have 'acted correctly' when blasting innocent people to death on tube trains, kicking people to death on London streets or dragging the disabled all over the road - all of them for perhaps considering stating the obvious - we live in a polcie state where the police can - and do - do what every they damned well like.

  19. Mr. Chuck
    Thumb Up

    Brilliant!

    nuff said...

  20. M7S
    WTF?

    Permissible to set fires using less lethal munitions if its outdoors

    I can't really see that going down well in the national parks, or any field of crop which rather limits its range of application. Even a good grass fire in the heat we're currently experiencing can be quite devastating.

    It must be why they call some police "Smokeys" (or is that too 70's?)

  21. Jerry Cornelius

    Johnny 5 is alive ...

    ... and he's a cap-busting badass.

  22. Spleen

    How...

    do you slip away from a bloody caravan? A large caravan, but still - were they too busy deploying dem newfangered robot thinger to surround the thing?

    1. Martin Budden Silver badge

      He wasn't even in it at the time.

      See my earlier post for explanation.

  23. countd
    FAIL

    They should have sent in...

    Tinribs*!

    * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinribs

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