Police in Holland are touting a unique anti-drone weapon – a specially trained eagle.
The Dutch National Police have trained an eagle to take down Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), as revealed in a video posted to YouTube Sunday.
The video, which is in Dutch, shows an eagle swooping to grasp a small commercial drone in its talons before landing with its “prey.”
A quadcopter drone that crashed onto the White House grounds last year highlighted the growing security threat posed by small UAVs. The White House incident came less than two weeks after a drone flew over the French presidential palace in Paris.
Drones, thanks to their small size and ability to hover low over the ground, can pose a huge security headache, experts have warned.
Technologies touted to combat UAVs include a new breed of ‘interceptor’ drones. Michigan Tech University, for example, has developed an anti-UAV octocopter that uses a net to disable smaller drones.
The US military is also ramping up its anti-drone efforts. In 2014, for example, the Office of Naval Research announced plans to build a laser weapon to shoot down drones.
Last year Boeing demonstrated a laser cannon that could be used to destroy drones.