Scalable Situational Awareness in a challenging maritime environment Littoral Combat Ship
This approach is timely, based on the rapidly evolving technology now available to the humblest of platforms, together with a rapid reduction in hull size, manpower and training required to operate such equipment. Size of vessel is increasingly being seen as less of a constraint to a modern navy, particularly one whose operating area is predominately in the littoral. As an example, compare the 6200 ton 480 crew British county
This designed‐in capacity to adapt to new, as yet unpredicted, requirements and technological innovation over the course of the vessel’s life and also has the potential to significantly reduce costs by delaying the need to replace the vessels. The result could be a 50 year rather than 20 year service life.
The heart of such an architecture is a common maritime processor, able to act as a central repository for data and to provide a central processing facility for shared applications. The result is a truly integrated and open architecture to achieve sensor fusion with, for example, radar software, electronic charting, gyro inputs and sensor data from an Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) all available through a seamless process. This common processor would in turn act as the interface to legacy ship systems, distributing data without prejudice to any required outlet in the vessel, whilst monitoring the system in order to provide full status and maintenance information. Such information can then be exported quickly and efficiently in order to deliver a single picture of truth across all of the operating environments.
This collated and coherent picture, outputted from a common maritime processor, can then be displayed to best effect through a wide range of commercially available equipment, ranging from a multi‐screen knowledge wall for a Combat Information Centre or Bridge to small hand‐held and ruggedised tablets for ship’s boats and landing parties. Increasingly, these will also incorporate a full suite of Command Decision Aids, enabling the small crew (which in turn reduces cost) to quickly make the right decision based on effective software, including the ability to distil thousands of contacts into the few suspect or hostile tracks which demands immediate attention. It is this ability to sift the important from the mundane across all environments in seconds, displayed as a common operating picture and instantaneously transmitted across the force, which will often mean the difference between mission success and failure.
32 Society of Maritime Industries Handbook & Members’ Directory 2017
class destroyer of the 1970s to the 3500 ton 60 crew Littoral Combat Ship available today. The former was a ship built around one missile system (the AAW Sea Slug missile) with a surveillance area effectively limited by the arc of the horizon. The latter able to dominate the environment with a host of compatible weapons and sensors over thousands of square miles.
Such an approach is already being seen in the increasing complexity and utility of the hitherto humble Offshore Patrol Vessel. Here, technology improvements in surveillance capability and the rapid expansion of unmanned vehicles have given the Offshore Patrol Vessel (OPV) capabilities that 20 years ago would have needed a large number of frigates to achieve. Indeed, as frigate and destroyer numbers decrease due to cost so the OPV is increasingly stepping into the breach in order to demonstrate maritime engagement and presence. As an example, the Royal Navy now routinely operates an OPV designed for UK waters to the Caribbean, a tasking previously conducted by a frigate for a number of decades.
In all, of the above the role of industry is critical in forming a mutually beneficial and transactional partnership with the customer. This acknowledgement that the customer’s requirements could be met by lower cost commercial and open architecture systems may in the short term be uncomfortable reading for some companies.
Nevertheless, an open business model and architecture facilitates the selection and integration of a system approach to the benefit of the customer, providing a real force multiplier through technology. Therefore, and in summary, are we approaching the point where quality and quantity are no longer a mutually exclusive choice for the majority of the world’s navies?
Tim Peacock, Maritime Business Development Manager, Lockheed Martin
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