The technology for the anti-IED system was licensed to Team
Technologies, based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Middle East Newsline reported. Team has already sent its
first shipment of 3,000 new water disruptors to Afghanistan in mid-2010.
Officials said the system was tested in Afghanistan and Iraq. They said
the portable clear plastic device filled with water contained explosives
that when detonated emits water in a thin blade.
"That allows you to have a high-speed, very precise water blade to go
through and do precision type of destruction on whatever improvised
explosive device it's going up against," Steve Todd, a mechanical engineer
and credited with inventing the system, said. "Immediately behind the
precision water blade is a water slug, which performs a general disruption
that tears everything apart."
The new device was meant to replace the method of detonating explosives
to neutralize IEDs. Oficials said the device would be transported by robots
to the suspected bomb.
"The soldiers helped on the design to make it more ruggedized and small
enough," Paul Reynolds, Team program manager, said. "It was a very good
collaboration."
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