Roadside bombs remain the biggest killers of coalition soldiers in Afghanistan, despite the weight of technology and force brought to bear on the problem by the US. Two new approaches to the issue are to be tested by JIEDDO, the Pentagon organization formed to defeat the IED threat.
One is Yellow Jacket, an Air Force Research Laboratory program to demonstrate a small unmanned helicopter carrying a specialized anti-IED payload. This comprises a high-definition electro-optical sensor and an "unintentional electromagnetic emissions" sensor, according to contractor CenTauri Solutions.
The latter is the key. All active electronic devices, including wireless receivers used to trigger to IEDs - radiate electronic energy, and US researchers have developed ways to detect and identify such devices based on these "unintentional" emissions. Techniques have been developed to detect receivers at safe distances, even in "noisy" urban environments. Unintentional emissions from receivers are hard to eliminate and may be stronger than those from transmitters, they say.
Photo: Scheibel
CenTauri has been awarded a $11.7 million contract for the Yellow Jacket demonstration, and has selected the 440lb Scheibel S-100 Camcopter unmanned helicopter to carry the payload.
The other JIEDDO demonstration project, called Sentinel Hawk, involves use of BAE Systems' (formerly Advanced Ceramics Research) Silver Fox small UAVs to provide self-protection of convoys. The 25lb UAVs will be launched from vehicles within the convoy to survey the road ahead for bombs. This requires modification of the UAV to operate safely within the dense counter-IED jamming broadcast by the convoy that forces other UAVs to keep their distance.
