Video of what is being called “Chinese super drones” has emerged over the past week, and the footage is being described as “terrifying”.

Footage of 10 lightweight drones made its way into the ether this past week thanks to a team at Zhejiang University, who released the video. It shows the drones bobbing and weaving through heavily wooded areas, moving swiftly amidst the foliage.

The drones take direction from an algorithm that helps them chart their surroundings in real-time, The Sun wrote in an article about the video. Their internal software updates “every few milliseconds”, which helps them avoid colliding with other objects.

The article also notes that since they don’t run on GPS, they can be deployed in areas with poor satellite coverage.

That’s all good and well – but the “terrifying” response to the video came when the same team at Zhejiang University released a video of the drones chasing a man through a forest of trees. After being instructed to keep focus on the man, they are able to follow him – even after he hides behind objects.

“The swarms’ capability of navigation and coordination in these films has attracted and inspired numerous researchers. Here, we take a step forward to such a future,” researchers in the journal Science Robotics commented. Dr Jonathan Aitken from Sheffield University praised the progress as an “excellent achievement”.

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