US Congress Suspends Purchases of Military HoloLens Headsets
Last year, the US Army received the first batch of 5,000 high-tech tactical AR glasses made by Microsoft, based on the HoloLens augmented reality headset and designed to provide an additional indication of the battlefield for soldiers of the ground forces, similar to the helmets of combat aircraft pilots. To equip all divisions with such devices in the amount of 121 thousand pieces, the Pentagon, under the contract, planned to spend $ 21.9 billion over the next 10 years.
The US military has completed extensive testing of Microsoft’s new multifunctional glasses. The soldiers of the 70th Army wore glasses for three weeks, playing three 72-hour scenarios, including movement towards the enemy, attack and defense.
Based on the results of the tests, a report was compiled to the Pentagon, which indicates that soldiers wearing Combat Goggles experienced headaches, dizziness, eye pain and nausea. More than 80% of the military personnel who participated in these tests experienced these symptoms three hours after using Combat Goggles. In addition, the report states that the current version of augmented reality glasses has many technical flaws.
According to Bloomberg, while a new version of augmented reality glasses is being developed, the US military will train on the old one.
