Leidos test and measurement experts help quiet Navy submarines against enemy sonar detection
WEST BETHESDA, Md. – Undersea warfare experts at Leidos Inc. in Reston, Va., will continue their test and measurement work to help the U.S. Navy keep surface warships and submarines as acoustically quiet as possible to shield them from enemy sonar.
Officials of the Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division in West Bethesda, Md. announced a $12.4 million contract to Leidos this week to continue with logistics, operations, and maintenance services in support of Navy and Marine signature silencing programs.
Leidos experts will help the Navy and Marine Corps develop technologies and procedures for quieting ships and undersea systems, as well as schedule repairs for the Southeast Alaska Acoustic Measurement Facility (SEAFAC) and that facility's west and east acoustic arrays.
Leidos also will conduct an array health assessment and array validation trials for the final SEAFAC installation and certification report, Navy officials say. SEAFAC's signal processing and in-water hardware were designed to accommodate a variety of sponsors and requirements.
The Southeast Alaska Acoustic Measurement Facility, located near Ketchikan, Alaska, is designed to make high fidelity passive acoustic signature measurements with directive line arrays and data collection and processing systems. SEAFAC enables the Navy to perform research evaluations to determine the sources of radiated acoustic noise, to assess vulnerability, and to develop quieting measures, officials say.
The facility is in Behm Canal near Ketchikan, Alaska, which provides an ideal ship acoustic measurement site with low ambient noise and minimal noise interference, say officials of the Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division.
SEAFAC helps record and analyze the underwater noise that submarines generate at a variety of speeds and depths that emulate underway operations. The facility also supports submarine target strength measurements. Experts collect acoustic signatures as submarines move back and forth between the site's dual bottom-mounted acoustic arrays.
The site not only collects the acoustic signatures of submerged submarines underway, but also those of motionless submerged submarines with onboard machinery secured or under unloaded operation. SEAFAC experts record sounds of motionless submarines by suspending the vessels on cables between suspension barges between measurement arrays. In this way they can evaluate the acoustic signatures of individual submarine machinery components.
The SEAFAC static site can test the acoustic signatures of surface vessels and submarines of all sizes and types moored or suspended between surface barges. Surface ships, for example, can be put on shore power with ship power and propulsion systems secured. In this way test personnel can obtain unique measurements on individual pieces of onboard equipment and machinery.
On this contract Leidos will do the work in Ketchikan, Alaska; Long Beach, Miss.; and Poulsbo, Wash., and should be finished by January 2018.
For more information contact Leidos online at www.leidos.com, or the Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division at www.navsea.navy.mil/Home/Warfare-Centers/NSWC-Carderock.
Learn more: search the Aerospace & Defense Buyer's Guide for companies, new products, press releases, and videos
John Keller | Editor
John Keller is editor-in-chief of Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine, which provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronic and optoelectronic technologies in military, space, and commercial aviation applications. A member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since the magazine's founding in 1989, Mr. Keller took over as chief editor in 1995.
