IG. No High-Speed Chases? (NAPS)—High-speed chases, made popular ontelevision shows andin the movies, might become a thing of the past, thanks to a new invention. It’s a laser gun that police can use to stop vehicles implanted with a special microchip. AIMING FOR SAFETY—Alaser gun aimedat a chip in a car can force it to a slow, safe stop from as far as a half mile away. The device is known as High Speed Avoidance Using Laser Technology, or HALT. If implanted in cars, the small microsensor would allow police with a remote control laser gun to force motorists to a slow, safe stop from as far as a half mile away. This new technology would have a major impactin California, where there were more than 6,600 police pursuits on California’s roads in 1998, 1,750 of which ended in accidents. Legislation has been introduced for all new cars in California to be implanted with such a chip by 2005. In most cases, the sensor would be imbedded near the license plate giving the officers something to aim at. For more information about the science of light, visit the Optical Society of America’s website at www.osa.org.
