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MikeL
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http://disruptivethinkers.blogspot.ca/2012/05/lessons-in-how-ipad-changed-close-air.html?m=1
Monday, May 14, 2012Disruptive Thinking and How the iPad Changed Close Air Support in Afghanistan
In the essay below, Capt. Michael Christman describes how an innovative junior officer took matters into his own hands, and in defiance of a reluctant bureaucracy, created an efficient and comprehensive solution using off the shelf, modern technology. It has helped transform tactical employment, and saved lives on the battlefield. He explores why the project was ultimately successful, and how others can emulate it. In many ways, it is an answer to the questions posed a few days ago by 1LT Atwell.
Dropping a bomb from 25,000 feet (or hovering just above the treetops) with an acceptable error of mere meters, only 500 feet away from friendly positions, is a challenge. However, Close Air Support (CAS) is one of the finest examples of joint operational teamwork in the military. It requires a high degree of coordination between airborne and ground based assets, many of whom have never met, and are from different services -- even different countries.
Integral to this coordination are the use of Gridded Reference Graphics (GRG's) that airborne fixed wing and helicopter aircraft use when identifying friendly and enemy positions (see sketch below). In the past, they were simply printed products, hard to keep organized, within a cockpit undergoing heavy G's and dynamic maneuvers. New products have changed the calculus.
Most Marine Corps aviators who have served in Afghanistan in a close air support role are familiar with the over 1,000 maps that make up the Helmand Valley. These maps are made using high resolution imagery with every building identified by a unique number. Such products enable aircrew to quickly correlate friendly and enemy locations, more effectively providing accurate and timely aviation fires for ground based units. This, in turn, saves the lives of young Americans and their allies.
Until recently, aircrew carried all 1000 map sheets individually. To find the right one required sorting through 30 lbs of paper to find the appropriate gridded reference graphic for a specific operational area. In fact, there are so many maps, they won’t all physically fit inside the cockpit -- an operational liability if you are told to provide support in an unanticipated area. Additionally, finding the right map could take several minutes -- precious time during a fire fight.
In order to solve this problem, an enterprising AH-1W Cobra attack helicopter pilot, Captain Jim “Hottie” Carlson, developed an application to electronically digitize and stitch these map sheets together so that a pilot could view them on an iPad. With the iPad’s embedded GPS, the Cobra now has a portable moving map, something that the early 1990’s era helicopter lacks. A single tablet also contains every conceivable map in an incredibly light and easily accessible touchscreen. Updates to the local geography and existing products are made with a simple download.
Of his own initiative and without official Marine Corps support, Captain Carlson provided his aging aircraft with a navigational system as advanced any available in the civilian world. This leap in capability cost less than $1000 per aircraft. Remarkably, an entire Marine Corps Cobra squadron can now be outfitted with iPads for less than the cost of fuel for one day of combat operations in Afghanistan.
While the technical details of the “Combat iPad” are best left for another discussion, the interesting story lies in exploring the key factors that allowed Captain Carlson, along with several other individuals, to overcome the bureaucratic hurdles they faced in bringing this program to operators.
First and foremost, Captain Carlson was the right person in the right place at the right time. As one of the senior pilots on the deployment, Captain Carlson had the tactical expertise and credibility to both understand the problem and navigate the bureaucratic morass of the Marine Corps. Integral to this was a technical background (a computer science major) that allowed him to view the problem from a different perspective and create a unique solution.
Second, Captain Carlson had the support of key players both in the squadron and at the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW). LtCol William “Hoss” Bufkin, a Cobra pilot who served on the Wing staff, was in the perfect position to help work through the bureaucratic red tape needed to bring these tablets to the battlefield. LtCol Bufkin had previously served as an evaluation pilot with the AH-1Z upgrade program and was no stranger to the aviation procurement process. With his experience, he was able to work through or around many of the top level challenges of procuring iPads and getting approval for their use in flight. LtCol Bufkin knew that the bureaucracy would tell him “no” when it came to asking for this new technology, but had the will to effectively fight the system in order to get this critical piece of equipment to the fleet.
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