Washington: Ever imagined how much can a helmet cost you? It’s way beyond your imagination.
Now imagine, you are riding your bike and you can actually see through your helmet – almost a 360 degree view. Possible? No?
Then read this.
Fighter pilots flying the deadly F-35 Lightning II jet have a very special secret weapon – a $400,000 helmet that allows them to see through the plane.
Yes, you heard it right, $400,000.
The helmet is fitted with six infrared cameras mounted around the aircraft that allow its pilots to ‘look through’ the air-frame, giving them a perfect 360 degree view of their surroundings and enemies.
And all of the information they need to complete their mission – airspeed, altitude and even warnings systems – are projected straight onto the helmet’s visor rather than the traditional ‘heads-up display’.
The cost of the US’s fifth-generation fighter has already risen to approximately $400 billion with a projected lifetime operating cost of $1.5 trillion.
“When the helmet is tuned correctly to the pilot’s eyes, you almost step into this other world where all this information comes in. You can look through the jet’s eyeballs to see the world as the jet sees the world,” Al Norman, an F-35 test pilot, told a leading international daily.