Filling the Gaps

Written by Michael Burnett

“Our technology investments address gaps that have been identified and validated by what we call the Joint Deployment and Distribution Enterprise partners,” Lou Bernstein, USTRANSCOM program manager for research, development, test and evaluation, told Military Logistics Forum.

“We use this community to help identify technology gap priorities,” Bernstein said. “Then we formally solicit projects using a broad area announcement or request for proposals to get industry and academia input. By e-mail, I go out to my services, national labs, combatant commands, our transportation components, selected defense agencies like the Defense Logistics Agency and the Defense Information Systems Agency, and other government partners like the Department of Homeland Security.”

Once Bernstein and his team receive responses regarding requests on technologies to fill capabilities gaps, several boards meet to evaluate the proposals. From the selected proposals, USTRANSCOM develops a plan to submit to the Joint Deployment and Distribution Enterprise partners. As such, Bernstein receives government and industry feedback on the plans before submitting them for command approval.

“This user chop on our proposed RDT&E investment, to me, is a unique element of USTRANSCOM’s program,” Bernstein explained. “We do this because we want to ensure that we are addressing the most pressing needs; we want to avoid duplication; and we are often not the ultimate acquisition transition organization, so we need their buy-in.”

The RDT&E effort focuses largely on boosting nearly mature technologies to the point that they provide some additional capability to USTRANSCOM logistics operations. Bernstein stressed that his command is careful to identify an existing program of record early in the evaluation process to ensure that transitioning technologies become part of a proven system fulfilling an acknowledged need. Doing so ensures that funds are not wasted pursuing efforts that may have no military application.

Cost-Effective Leadership

USTRANSCOM, based at Scott Air Force Base (AFB), Ill., further saves money with the structure of its RDT&E program. The budget authority for the program lies within the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), while the program execution remains a responsibility for USTRANSCOM. The arrangement reduces the cost of overhead, eliminating the need for additional staff at Scott AFB to support budget execution. In addition, it strengthens the relationship between USTRANSCOM and DLA, which boosts the Joint Deployment and Distribution Enterprise partnership. Every military organization has logistics and supply needs, Bernstein said, which makes it necessary to designate leadership within the Defense Department to coordinate RDT&E efforts.

“It was envisioned that there were significant cost reduction and capability increases that could be obtained through leadership by USTRANSCOM,” Bernstein elaborated. “So that’s a reason why [the command] first got a limited RDT&E line to explore innovation and intermodal seams. We don’t build faster ships or faster aircraft. That’s a service function. We try to concentrate on those things where everybody has a role to play, but trying to identify the leader to drive the innovation is hard to do.”

These funding arrangements and leadership roles are very new, with DLA first establishing a limited experimental line of funding in fiscal 2006. The experimental line continued in fiscal 2007, and is now set to become a permanent line of funding in fiscal 2008.

“Based on our early program successes and validation of our program management execution process, the DoD saw fit to establish a permanent line commencing in FY 08,” Bernstein said. “In FY 08, that line is $25 million. It grows to $30 million in FY 09 and beyond.”

One early success for the program was with the Joint Precision Airdrop System (JPADS) Mission Planner, where USTRANSCOM funded the development of a software package that greatly increased the accuracy of aerial supply drops. Using the JPADS Mission Planner, ground force commanders gained the ability to resupply their units in remote locations where conventional ground convoys could not go or would prove inefficient.

U.S. Joint Forces Command (USJFCOM) had already established a JPADS advanced concept technology demonstration (ACTD). USJFCOM had sponsored an autonomous guidance unit attached to a pallet dropped from an airplane such as a C-17 or C-130, Bernstein explained. After the pallet drops and deploys its parachute, the guidance unit steers the pallet to its designated pickup location.

“When they initially developed the thing, you had to upload the JPADS guidance unit with the required drop information before you ever loaded the pallet onto the aircraft,” Bernstein recalled. “Then the aircraft would have to fly two, three, four hours later to drop the pallets. By that time, the weather has changed, the forces have moved somewhere else, and you couldn’t reprogram. So you had to drop them, but it might be too far away for the operating forces.”

The USTRANSCOM RDT&E program

invested in the technology and added the ability to update the wind data and force location data while the shipment was on its way to the drop zone, providing the system with drop data that was much more accurate. The procedure also became useful for cargo drops that did not use the JPADS Mission Planner, enabling cargo planes to receive updated information before dropping cargo without a guidance unit.

“We were able to improve the accuracy of both of those drops, reducing the exposure of ground forces, and at the same time it keeps the delivery aircraft out of enemy asymmetric actions,” Bernstein declared.

JPADS Mission Planner

The JPADS effort involved a team of contractors that included Draper Laboratory of Cambridge, Mass.; Planning Systems Inc. of Reston, Va.; Vertigo Inc. of Lake Elsinore, Calif.; Mist Mobility Integrated Systems Technology Inc. of Ontario, Canada; Capewell Components Co. of South Windsor, Conn.; and Strong Enterprises of Orlando, Fla.

Draper Laboratory, a non-profit research-and- development center, has been involved with the development of precision-guided delivery systems since their inception in the late 1990s, Phil Hattis, Draper’s chief engineer for JPADS, said. The portable planning system that Draper first started work on eventually became today’s JPADS system.

“That program over a few years evolved into a laptop system that could acquire data onboard the carrier aircraft from external data sources, in particular drop spots and weather conditions,” Hattis said. “That capability grew, up until around 2003 or 2004, purely as a prototype. They were adding things like a round parachute, which is scalable. They added some capabilities for classified transmission of additional forecast information and additional target information while we were flying.”

The Army recognized that the precision- guided delivery solution could solve problems experienced by troops in combat areas around 2004, Hattis said, and the prototype was mature enough at the time to become an initial operating capability. The Army began rapid fielding of the system in 2006, with more than 500 systems in various stages of procurement in the theater of U.S. Central Command.

JPADS introduced a means by which troops could receive supplies with accuracy but also enabled logistics personnel to evade enemy fire, explained Chris Gibson, Draper’s JPADS program manager.

“The previous air drop capabilities were only valid up to a ceiling of 3,000 or 4,000 feet,” he said. “Beyond that, if you released a payload from the back of a plane, it was unguided, and you didn’t know where it was going to go. So they had to fly at lower altitudes in order to obtain reasonable accuracy.”

But flying at lower altitudes leaves cargo aircraft vulnerable to small arms fire from the ground. To avoid that threat, cargo aircraft should ideally fly at 5,000 feet or higher. Cargo aircraft encounter another problem dropping unguided supplies from such heights, however, as their payloads could fall into enemy territory or become otherwise lost.

“The mission planning is an important component of that and increased capability comes from the modeling component,” Gibson said. “What happens to the payload when it exits the plane? How long does it take for the parachute to deploy? If you accurately account for that, which a precision- guided system does, then that is about half the battle in getting accuracy on the ground. The other half is releasing it at the right point and if you have a steerable system, you can remove a lot of errors as well.”

The JPADS Mission Planner displays the targeting and weather information it receives and overlays that information over maps and aerial photography available for the specific combat theater. Crew members can use that information to decide whether to execute the plan based on current circumstances.

Overall, the use of the JPADS Mission Planner has reduced the number of low-altitude aircraft sorties and helicopter resupply missions as well as the number of ground-based convoys in support of supply operations. This was accomplished by delivering more supplies more efficiently, officials said. By reducing the number of ground convoys required, the JPADS system also reduces the exposure of troops to improvised explosive devices used to attack them.

Over the past year, JPADS has saved an estimated 400 helicopter resupply missions and 200 ground resupply missions, Gibson estimated. JPADS delivers roughly 50,000 pounds of supplies a day to remote areas or areas that are highly resistant to ground missions.

“You can update the mission until maybe 15-20 minutes before you actually release the payload,” Hattis said. “So if you are flying from Europe to Iraq or Afghanistan, you can keep getting updates on what you plan to do until very shortly before you are ready to release the payload. So you have maximum benefit of evolving knowledge about the conditions at the locations of drop sights.”

More Success Stories

The USTRANSCOM RDT&E program has produced some other notable successes recently, including the Joint Modular Intermodal Distribution System (JMIDS)—a defense initiative to standardize commercial and military transportable containers and platform systems with the integration of asset visibility for rapid battlefield distribution.

Garrett Inc. of Los Angeles and Seabox Inc. of East Riverton, N.J., are working with USTRANSCOM to increase supply chain efficiency and delivery throughput by sea, air and land in a program that lasts through fiscal 2008, Bernstein said. “We are already delivering new capabilities, as witnessed by the recent Marine Corps purchase of 200 of the joint modular intermodal containers,” Bernstein said.

“That’s one of the spin-offs of this effort. We don’t necessarily have to wait until the end of a project to deliver capability. As we see it, we try to spin it off, and this is just one good example of that.”

Even programs that do not work as originally conceived are capable of providing benefits to military logistics operations. Take the Deployable Cargo Screener, for example.

“This ACTD addressed a requirement to screen palletized cargo for explosives,” Bernstein stated. “A concern came up following 9/11 regarding potential terrorist use of cargo shipments to obtain their objectives.”

ICx Nomadics, headquartered in Stillwater, Okla., spearheaded the effort to develop different detector systems for handheld devices that could scan for explosives in cargo but this specific technology has yet to be perfected. “We had hoped to produce a handheld device to screen cargo for explosives prior to on-loading in an aircraft in a way that would not slow down the pace of distribution,” Bernstein said. “The technology project did not produce a product that met all aircraft screening performance requirements— it had too many false positives in the long run.

“Still, more than 300 systems of these handhelds have been purchased to date. Some are being used to support current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others are being incorporated by the services into robotics for enhanced force protection capabilities against IEDs,” he added. And so even a logistical near-miss can become a hit with the proper RDT&E guidance. ♦