Tactical Decision Aid Model Upgrades

SSN missions often require littoral operations in shallow, geographically confined regions, where the submarine hull, wakes and/or exposed masts and periscopes could be vulnerable to detection by threat nonacoustic sensors. In addition, little is known about the effect of hull attachments such as the Dry Deck Shelter and Advanced SEAL Delivery System on submarine detectability, with attendant risk to SOF missions launched from SSNs and SSGNs. To compound the problem, nonacoustic ASW models used by Tactical Decision Aids (TDAs) do not treat important threat modalities in the littorals. To overcome this limitation, Dynamics Technology, Inc. (DTI) will develop and/or upgrade several nonacoustic ASW models and tailor them for use in TDAs. Specific modeling upgrades will include radar detection of periscope/mast wakes, maritime surface search radar detection of submarine-generated wakes, and vulnerability models of submarines with hull attachments. These choices will ensure that Phase II TDA modeling upgrades, when combined with modalities covered by extant TDAs, will provide the broadest initial capability to the Fleet.