Naval Air Crewman Emergency Armor Release (NACEAR)

Bunker Supply Co. proposes a unique emergency release system that can selectively shed hard plate armor from the survival vests of combat rotorcraft operators during emergency in-water survival situations. This will afford rotary wing pilots and crew members additional buoyancy by jettisoning dense armor plates without losing their vests and critical gear thereto attached. It will assist in keeping the operator buoyant while other lifesaving devices are deployed, or while other escape and rescue options are identified. Current quick-release designs are gravity-based, and are ill-suited to waterborne operation. Existing solutions often require multiple pulls and re-gripping of a release strap, which is difficult and unreliable in high-stress survival situations. The emergency release system that Bunker Supply Co. proposes is deployed by a single-handed, single-stroke continuous motion. It is manually-operated to prevent automatic actuation in situations where armor ejection could be counterproductive (e.g. combat environments). The quick, reliable release mechanism framework will be further developed and tested for within the Phase I effort with the outcome demonstrating the feasibility of the proposed approach. In Phase II, additional development and testing will lead to a commercial vest prototype ready for human studies.