+44 (0)20 8748 9797
A diversity of technology enablers will be under the spotlight at UDT Europe, a premier conference and exhibition dedicated to undersea defence technology, which takes place at the Congress Centre Hamburg, Germany from 8 – 10 June 2010.
In his presentation entitled The Common Combat System Programme, Lt Cdr Roger Shepherd, RN of MoD Abbey Wood argues that navies can no longer afford to deliver and sustain capable Submarine Combat Systems, both now and in the future, without the utilisation of the essential enables of Commercial off the Shelf technology and Open Systems Architecture (OSA).
He states that the pathfinder programme which will enable this is the Common Combat System (CCS) initiative which seeks to utilise COTS products, commercial architectures, operating systems, applications and standards where possible and by taking advantage of the commercial investment and volume that comes with participating in a global market.
However, in order to take advantage of this global market it is necessary to re-evaluate the manner in which navies undertake many aspects of their business, in particular, by recognising that they are no longer the dominant customer in a small and specialist market but are becoming a smaller customer in a very large and diverse market.
Lt Cdr Shepherd asserts that “the benefits of utilising COTS technology and OSA will not be achieved if we continue to design, procure and support our COTS equipment using the same traditional methods used for our legacy bespoke equipment. Therefore, an evolving Combat System Enterprise based upon the exploitation of COTS equipment and OSA is also required if we are to prevent erosion of the financial and programmatic benefits of the CCS.
Effect of ASW on whales
Simulation is an effective way of assessing the efficiency of naval forces. Laurent Mifsud and Martine Glemarec of DGA/DT/Techniques Navales, Toulon, will describe the acoustical effects of an operating ASW force on a group of beaked whales that were coincidentally present in the area. This was achieved using the time-event simulation engine ASTON ((Atelier de Simulation Technico-Operationnel Naval). ASTON enables the kinematics and acoustics of the assets to be modelled, while a Petri place/transition net is used to model pseudo random animal behaviours.
Camouflage colours for submarines
A submarine conducting covert operations at, near or inside territorial waters of a coastal state is always at risk of detection and pursuit, a risk which increases when the vessel is operating close to the surface. In this case environmental conditions are of particular importance. Besides their indirect signatures, the hull colour of submarines can have a significant impact on their visible perceptibility.
In this paper Dr Jörg Förster, Bundeswehr Technical Centre for Ships and Naval Weapons – WTD71 will describe two sea experiments that were carries out in 2007 in the Baltic and Mediterranean seas to study the camouflage effectiveness of different colours.
The main objective was to determine the impact of the sea area, studying factors such as water clarity, its colour and the environmental conditions on the detectability of submerged test objects that were painted with different colours. In accordance with the Secchi disk measuring method, depth visibility thresholds were determined for 10 colour plates. These studies were completed by multispectral in-situ absorption and beam attenuation measurements to analyse sea surface layer inhomogeneities. Results show that for both areas solely one colour provides the best camouflage.
Ends
For further information please contact:
Nick Johnstone or Carol Seath at CMS Strategic
Tel: +44 (0)20 8748 9797 Email: carol.seath@cmsstrategic.com
Note to Editors
Clarion Events Limited is the largest independent and one of the top three events organising companies in the country, running exhibitions, conferences and seated events across Britain, Europe, the Americas, Middle East and Asia. Clarion’s business-to-business and business-to-consumer events serve 15 different market sectors including defence & security, leisure, entertainment, finance, retail, gaming, fine art and energy. Clarion currently employs a staff of 200+ people in four offices: London (Earls Court); Birmingham (NEC); St Charles (MI), USA and Maarsen (The Netherlands).