Advanced Material System for Reduced Wave Slam Energy in Combatant Craft

Occupants aboard Navy combatant patrol and assault craft, as well as other high speed watercraft, are required to operate in extremely demanding conditions, including rough sea states at high speeds. Severe and repetitive shock loads resulting from wave impacts lead to single-event traumatic injuries, accumulated damage to legs and spine, fatigue, and loss of situational awareness. Such debilitating effects unnecessarily endanger the crew, jeopardize mission success, and have led to the untimely retirement of highly trained personnel. Recent increases in OPTEMPO has resulted in an alarming increase in the rate of shock-induced injury (~30%), which in turn leads to a significant depletion in qualified crewmembers. To remedy this issue, the proposed team of InnoVital Systems (formerly Techno-Sciences, Inc.) and the University of Maryland Smart Structures Laboratory, proposes to develop a smart passive isolation (SPI) system. SPI development will leverage novel material technologies and the teams experience and expertise in wave impact attenuation, dynamic modeling and simulation, novel fluid designs, and novel fluid energy attenuator designs, to yield a non-powered, low-cost, highly reliable shock isolation system that will optimize attenuation across a range of wave impact profiles for a given available stroking distance.