DAHLGREN, Va. –
The first team of scientists and engineers arrive at Upper Machodoc Creek on a still and steamy summer morning. They’ve brought with them a field-ready research station: a laptop computer, a controller, a base station and a BlueBoat — a small, unmanned vessel commonly used in robotics operations.
A heron stands sentry at the water’s edge; farther out, a fish breaks the surface and disappears like a mirage.
At Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division (NSWCDD), science and nature meet again.
Luis Valcourt-Colon, a scientist with the Weapons Control and Integration Department’s Unmanned Control Systems team, settles at a picnic table with the laptop and base station while a pair of early-career engineers and scientists head toward the water with the BlueBoat. It is bulky, with two hulls connected by a crossbow, and not easily maneuverable. In the water, though, this off-the-shelf vessel is ideal for the mission that is about to be underway.
For the last three days, this small team, along with six others, has worked out a solution to the weeklong Workforce Development Innovation Challenge: Develop a small, unmanned surface vessel (sUSV) with commercially available software and hardware to conduct autonomous intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions on the water.
They have 35 minutes to prepare the BlueBoat, then just 10 minutes to autonomously search for and identify a target of interest — a manned research vessel inside the operation area — and return to the launch point.
The sUSV is lowered into the water.
‘Don’t wait until you have all the answers’
Departments spend months designing Workforce Development Innovation Challenges, held six times a year and aimed at tackling real-life issues facing NSWCDD and the U.S. Navy. The most recent challenge, developed by the Intelligence Automation Team in the Weapons Control and Integration Department, addresses the Navy’s shift toward small, unmanned boats in support of the fleet.
“It’s a fun challenge, but it also matches the technical things we’re seeing in theater,” Valcourt said, who also serves as a mentor. “That’s the goal of the fleet — to take folks off the boat and out of harm’s way.”
Challenges kick off on a Monday morning inside Dahlgren’s Innovation Lab, or “iLab,” a space for scientists and engineers to prototype solutions to complex issues facing warfighters.
The number of participants is capped at 40; most are within their first three years of government service and must complete a workforce development challenge for promotion, said iLab Director Tyler Truslow. They learn about Dahlgren’s culture of cross-departmental collaboration, about creativity, rapid prototyping and human-centered design. They receive the problem statement at the center of the challenge. Then, they get 30 minutes to mingle and split into teams.
“They all introduce themselves and talk about what their background is and what their technical skillset looks like, what they do in their day job,” he said. “They try to figure out, ‘OK, I’ve got this skillset, you’ve got this skillset, let’s go find somebody that has this other thing we’re missing.’ The team-building part is one of the things we want them to gain experience in.”
This time around, there is an additional challenge: Find and name a team lead who will put together a project plan and coordinate the tasking.
“They need to be the one giving our team updates every single day, a couple of times a day, on where the team’s at. They need to be the ones that are tracking what task everybody’s working on and making sure people are staying focused,” Truslow said.
While challenges aim to find useful solutions that could be scaled for real-life use, it’s about more than that.
“We always say the real product is the engineers and scientists that come through it,” Truslow said.
In other words, it’s not so much about having the answers. It’s about getting to them. The destination is always important. But so is the journey. Prototype, test, get feedback and refine. Again, and again.
“Try stuff,” Truslow tells the engineers and scientists. “Don’t wait until you have all the answers. When something doesn’t work, that’s just as valuable as when it does.”
Troubleshooting the unexpected
There are always unexpected outcomes. Each new Workforce Development Innovation Challenge seems as daunting as the one before it, improbable if not impossible to complete in a few days.
“And they always end up surprising you. They kind of blow your expectations again and again,” Truslow said. “They are very, very smart, and they’re resourceful.”
After putting BlueBoats together on the first day, most teams turned to affixing an off-the-shelf digital camera to their vessels, which must transmit videos or photos back to their base stations. Electronics must be waterproof. This is, after all, the Navy.
One group starts cutting wood with a handsaw to build the camera mount — an impressive, outside-the-box idea Truslow can’t imagine he’d ever come up with. Ultimately, the concept doesn’t work. But that’s all part of the process.
Imagine, generate and merge ideas. Prototype, test and implement. Maintain a sense of urgency. Embrace innovation.
There are other stops and starts among the teams. Other unexpected setbacks. A lost propeller. The inability, at first, to create a geofence in which the vessel must operate. An unexplained drop in voltage that endangers the mission. Some teams set their ambitions too high. Others make assumptions they shouldn’t.
There is also troubleshooting. More prototyping. There are adjustments, all the way up to the morning of test day, and when teams brief department leadership, they come loaded with lessons.
It’s very easy to shoot yourself in the foot if you have enough knowledge to get yourself in trouble, shares one group.
Know when to try harder and when to move on, another team shares.
But before resolution comes the rising action — and the story’s climax out on Machodoc Creek where an osprey wings in the hazy sky overhead.
The first sUSV is in the water, and there are issues to work out: the boat is out of its virtual boundary. The controller, which they use initially, doesn’t seem to be working properly.
Soon, though, it’s operating the way it should. The camera feeds back images. The sUSV is maneuvering from waypoint to waypoint. The target boat idles inside the operational area.
Time is up.
There are thresholds and there are objectives. Team one has met every threshold and most objectives, and probably would have met them all with more time, Valcourt says.
Two engineers lug the sUSV out of the water. Team two is here, ready for action.