Better Training on Desktops
Written by Henry Canaday
MT2 2011 Volume: 16 Issue: 8 (December)
Desktop training systems are playing an expanding role in military training. They can be used for the most basic tasks all soldiers and other servicemembers must master, and they can be used to simulate extremely complex tasks performed by specialists in particular weapons and systems. In one innovation, desktop simulation will soon be used in training where tasks are not defined to teach officers to think flexibly about very difficult challenges.
Economy is one reason for the shift to desktop training. Desktop systems can often train both recruits and officers much faster and less expensively than instructors, said Ray Perez, program officer for the Office of Naval Research’s (ONR) Warfighter Performance Department. Convenience can be another reason, as software is deployed on laptops and other personal devices. One future use might be providing Navy corpsmen in the field with the ability, using handheld devices like ruggedized smartphones, to communicate novel symptoms back to systems or experts that would provide advice on correct treatment, dosage and evacuation decisions, Perez said.
Perez manages two types of desktop training systems. The first is given to all Navy recruits at Great Lakes. This includes training in the basics of naval ships for recruits, many of whom have not been on a Navy or other ship in their lives. “We teach them how to navigate their way around the ship and find compartments,” Perez explained.
Another basic desktop course instructs recruits in damage control. “If there’s a fire or flood onboard and they do not handle it correctly, the ship sinks,” Perez said. Recruits are trained on situational awareness, how to deal with damage and how to communicate to damage-control officers. The course takes 80 minutes and recruits are afterward tested on competency on a mockup of a Burke-class destroyer. Experiments show desktop training reduces the time recruits take for correct actions and cuts errors by 50 percent.
Another basic desktop system deals with recruits who enter the Navy with less than 8th-grade reading skills. Instead of two weeks in instructor-led classes, recruits are given 40 hours of desktop tutoring. The desktop system has increased reading levels by two grades, equivalent to two weeks of instructor-led classes. The system is like a game, but with a set of objectives, constant feedback and a built-in pedagogical strategy.
An entirely different set of desktop systems is used at the Navy’s Surface Warfare School (SWS) in Newport, R.I., to address two challenges. Naval weapons and systems have become much more complex. And adversaries no longer fight by the book. “We have to train people in adaptive problem solving,” Perez noted.
One desktop system is the Tactical Action Officers Sandbox, which trains officers to plan and execute tactics for dealing with submarines, missiles or enemy ships. Another is the Adaptive Device for Adaptive Performance Training (ADAPT), which does the same kind of training for force protection in port.
Aptima developed ADAPT for the Navy to meet two challenges, according to Chief Research Officer Jared Freeman. “The first is the scientific problem of training decision-makers to adapt well to novel problems for which there are not good rules or standard operating procedures. The second is the specific instance of force protection by the Navy.”
Aptima was retained by ONR under a Small Business Innovation Research grant and teamed with an Arizona State University expert to develop ADAPT for the SWS. Especially since the USS Cole incident, the Navy has been concerned with protecting ships and sailors in tight ports surrounded by many small vessels. Freeman said the Navy does a good job in selecting and defining the roles of forceprotection officers. The problem is that there can be surprises on arrival in port: protests on docks, foreign dignitaries seeking to board ships or a local requirement to keep ship guns covered.
“How can officers learn to adapt smartly to these surprises?” asked Freeman. ADAPT trains for problems that have not been anticipated or well-defined. It tutors officers to think of first principles and develop adaptive expertise in solving ill-defined problems. “We want to train them to think flexibly and ensure they get a wide variety of experience,” Freeman explained. “For example, is there a diplomatic issue? Is the problem protecting a perimeter? Are there intelligence issues?” Aptima and ONR are building a large library of scenarios that will be tough enough to teach flexible thinking while not dooming officers to failure.
ADAPT is not a simulator, but presents each scenario as a story. Officers must assess risks, choose an action and justify their decision on first principles, including diplomatic issues, force precision and flexible response.
Aptima hopes to have ADAPT up and running by the middle of 2012 with a minimum of about 50 scenarios. Officers will confront each scenario in five to 10 minutes and be guided through additional scenarios according to how well they do on early ones.
ADAPT uses a multi-media platform and can be delivered on desktops, laptops and some tablets. It is designed to facilitate incorporation of new scenarios. The same techniques may also be used to train officers in counter-piracy decisions. Freeman believes the approach has wide applicability in the Navy and Marine Corps.
Camber makes desktop training systems for AH-64 Apache helicopters and for unmanned aerial systems (UASs), according to John Tidball, vice president and division manager of the Engineering and Technology Division of the company’s Aerospace Defense Group. The systems work on iPads, tablet PCs and other handheld devices.
The UAS system trains both UAS pilots and sensor operators and, together with the Apache trainer, can train on collaboration between UASs and helicopters. Camber training systems are open source. They simulate in three dimensions and use the Virtual Battlespace (VBS2) game engine and Flash content. The systems are portable and can be put on both servers and touch-screen iPads. “We embrace commercially available tools and modern media presentation,” Tidball noted. “We are agile in incorporating commercial methods and can provide content to customers faster.”
Tidball predicted that avatars displaying intelligent behavior will increasingly be used in military training systems.
Kenneth Arrington, simulation lead of training aids, devices, simulators and simulations (TADSS) for Army UASs, has been working on training simulation for the medium-altitude MQ-1C Grey Eagle. “A year ago, we wanted a desktop system for individual and collective training; we called people in for demonstrations and Camber shined,” Arrington recalled.
Camber and the Army worked on the system for a year, and the Army is now getting ready to field it. The system trains both airborne and ground-based personnel and can thus train an entire unit. Only three of the system’s lessons are specific to the Grey Eagle, Arrington said, while the rest are applicable to other UASs.
Arrington thus sees wide applicability of the Camber system and is impressed with Camber’s work. “The simulation is the best I’ve seen. We are really happy with it. It is plug-and-play and works flawlessly.” A platoon can get six devices and do all its simulation training, both individual and team, within the unit.
AVT Simulation has a desktop simulation system for training gunners on Apaches that is used in the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates. CEO Robert Abascal believes it could also be a highly economic system for recurrent gunner training for U.S. forces.
“It addresses the perishable skills of Apache gunners, who have 60 switches that they must know instinctively,” Abascal explained. “It is like going to the golf range and building muscle memory.”
AVT simulation covers not just individual skills but the communication and collective efforts of team members on networked multiple crews. Abascal said it includes 85 percent of the tasks in the Apache crew training manual.
Low cost, about 10 percent of practical alternatives, also distinguishes the AVT system. Abascal argued that this economy enables instruction of more crews more rapidly. The system works on desktops and laptops and can be projected on smart-boards in classrooms. It is deployable and self-contained, allowing crewmembers to use it without instructors.
The system is not on VBS2 yet, but there are plans to do that for the U.K. system. “It’s the next logical step,” Abascal noted. He also plans to incorporate additional aircraft for manned and unmanned tactics.
Some desktop systems are already well advanced, in sophistication and deployment. MetaVR’s visuals are used in desktop training systems for UAS operators and for JTACs.
MetaVR’s Virtual Reality Scene Generator (VRSG) is used to simulate a UAS in a variety of ways, ranging from using VRSG’s internal camera payload model, in which the telemetry of the simulated UAV is provided by a DIS or HLA entity, to fully integrated applications such as the MUSE UAV tactical trainer.
Most of the over 1,000 VRSG licenses fielded for UAS training are used through the JTC/SIL MUSE/AFSERS simulation system. VRSG provides the visualization component that generates synthetic payload scene video and/or imagery of the 3-D battlefield with simulated target entities. This video and imagery is fed to a tactical or generic UAS/intelligence platform control station where operators perform air vehicle and payload control functions, and an air vehicle and datalink simulation.
MetaVR VRSG provides the synthetic camera payload for several UAS programs, including the Shadow TADSS Army National Guard simulators and the embedded Shadow Crew Trainer One System Ground Control Station (GCS), which is used for training Shadow, Hunter, Aerosonde and Grey Eagle UAS. In a classroom configuration, VRSG is used to train UAS operators at the Institutional Mission Simulator used at the UAS schoolhouse at Fort Huachuca, Ariz. This facility consists of mockups of the actual GCS vehicles. In normal operation, the One System GCS is used to control the flight of the UAS and receive its telemetry. When the system operators are not flying the actual UAS, they can fly a simulated UAS using the same hardware they use to operate the real system—using the JTC/SIL MUSE air vehicle and datalink simulation software and VRSG. Thus, an operator does not necessarily know whether the video feed is coming from a simulator or a real camera video feed.
MetaVR visuals are also used in desktop configurations to simulate the functionality needed for JTAC warfighters training in close air support (CAS) exercises. Air National Guard JTACs have developed their own desktop CAS training simulators in which soldiers use VRSG in a first-person shooter mode with a gamepad as the navigation device; in this mode, a trainee sees targeting and designating symbology similar to what the JTAC would see in a range finder or a laser designator.
Collaborating with other players in a simulated exercise with VRSG, a JTAC trainee at the desktop can simulate walking and using binoculars and designator devices, while interacting with others and communicating target coordinates through a voice interface on a simulated radio over the network. The trainee views a UAV feed provided by VRSG through a ROVER device, while locating common reference points for carrying out a mission and laser designating a target. The STANAG 4096-compliant metadata encoding in the VRSG video stream stimulates the fielded ROVER hardware as if it was receiving telemetry from an actual ISR asset. VRSG also transmits a laser designator protocol data unit in DIS format that can be read by other simulators on the network to simulate a digital hand-off of coordinates. This service-developed Air National Guard JTAC simulator helped provide the basis for the Air Combat Command to approve MetaVR software to be used in simulated JTAC training. With this approval, issued in 2009, the training hours JTACs spend using VRSG contribute to approved simulator training credits for terminal attack control requirements.
Over the past dozen years, VT MÄK has developed a set of desktop simulation tools for commanders and staff in the Army, Marines and Air Force, explained Business Development Executive Gary Morisette. These separate systems have now been folded into a tool called Battle Command. “It is intuitive and easy to use,” Morisette emphasized.
Battle Command incorporates a master scenario event List that drives events and requires decisions by students to concentrate on specific training objectives. It facilitates both the creation of new scenarios and terrains for simulation. It can represent up to 32 factions in a fight.
Battle Command simulates the actual command and control systems officers use in battle, for greater realism. In about 10 months it will interoperate with the new digital communication systems the Air Force is moving toward. ♦