ENABLING MODERNIZATION
MOUNT UP
IVAS Mounted amplifies capabilities for Soldiers, eliminating deadly blind spots.
by Courtney E. Bacon T
he Army is looking to apply the critical new capabilities of the Integrated Visual Augmen- tation System (IVAS) to mounted platforms in an effort to amplify the combat advantage
that the system delivers to a single dismounted Soldier.
Maj. Kevin Smith is the IVAS team member responsible for platform integration, out of the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities and Development Command C5ISR Center’s Night Vision and Electronic Sensors Directorate. He led a platform integration event in January at Joint Base Lewis- McChord, Washington.
“Up until this point, IVAS has really been focused on the dismounted Soldiers and getting that fighting goggle right,” said Smith. “So in parallel, we in the Night Vision Electronic Sensors Directorate have been working to build in applications to leverage both new and existing sensors on the vehicles to give the Soldier not just enhanced visual situational awareness, but also C2 [command and control] situational awareness while they're inside of a platform or vehicle.”
Soldiers from 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team (1-2 SBCT) and 3rd Infantry Division joined the cross-enter- prise Team IVAS at Joint Base Lewis-McChord to learn the breadth of the IVAS capability set and to provide feedback on what would be the most operationally effective appli- cation as the technology integrates onto larger platforms.
Soldiers in armored vehicles like the Bradley or Stryker can’t consistently maintain visual situational awareness of their position in relation to external forces or targets on the battlefield. Because IVAS uses sensors to enhance natural information visibility and processing, the integrated IVAS
team is working to tackle how to best use those sensors to provide a real-time external view of physical surroundings to Soldiers in the back of closed and often moving vehicles.
“In the past, as the Soldier in the back who's going to actually be dismounting on the objective, you may have a single screen to look at that can maybe toggle between the driver’s view or the commander's view, or the gunner’s view, or perhaps you're looking through periscope blocks or asking the crew themselves what is actually happening around you,” said Sgt. 1st Class Joshua Braly of the Soldier Lethality Cross-Functional Team. “But overall, when you are buttoned up in the back of a platform, you have very limited situational awareness to what you’re walking into.”
Beyond addressing the original problem set for the
dismounted warfighter, the Army is looking to apply IVAS to these capability gaps of the mounted force in order to allow Soldiers to maintain both command and control and visual situational awareness seamlessly across Army platforms.
SOLDIER EXPERIENCE “I struggled when I was a squad leader getting out of the bay, not knowing where I was because we get dropped at different spots in the op order,” said Sgt. John Martin, Bradley master gunner from 3rd Infantry Division. “Not having information on the ground was definitely a chal- lenge that tripped us up.”
Te squads took turns in the Stryker and Bradley vehicles, testing each camera view and function, power manage- ment, communications and the ease of mounting and dismounting with the IVAS. Te Soldiers quickly saw that the capabilities being developed for dismounted Soldiers
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