INDIAN HEAD, Md. - Naval Surface Warfare Center Indian
Head Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technology Division (NSWC IHEODTD) officially
announced the command's first private-public partnership under the command's
Center for Industrial and Technical Excellence (CITE) designation, July 30.
CITE is a statutory authority allowing public-private
partnerships to perform work related to the command's core competencies. This
designation allows the Navy to more efficiently maintain an organic energetics
capability and manage under-utilized capacity.
"Under the four-year partnership with Chemring, our
division may manufacture up to 11,000 double-base extruded N-5 propellant
grains for the Anti-Personnel Obstacle Breaching System (APOBS). APOBS is used
by Soldiers, Marines and allied ground troops to enable safe personnel transit
through mine fields and razor wire protected zones," said NSWC IHEODTD
Technical Director Ashley Johnson.
The APOBS propellant grain manufacturing is the first in
a series of extruded double base propellant grain opportunities planned to be
jointly manufactured by the partnership. Once the propellant grains are
inspected, tested and certified, they will be provided to Chemring Ordnance for
loading into APOBS.
"We received CITE arsenal designation in May 2014,
for our core competencies of energetics, ordnance, naval gun systems, EOD
technologies, ordnance packaging, handling, storage and transportation and the
technical expertise required to acquire, maintain and sustain these
systems," said NSWC IHEODTD Deputy Technical Director Amy O'Donnell.
NSWC IHEODTD is the first Navy activity to hold both
depot- and arsenal-level designation.
"When
industry or private organization approaches us, and if we have capacity that
exists in our core mission areas, I can initiate a Business Case
Analysis," said NSWC IHEODTD Commanding Officer Capt. Vincent Martinez.
"If I can demonstrate it is going to be in the best interest of the U.S.
Navy, I ask senior leadership to review that Business Case Analysis. Once
permissions and negotiations are agreed on, we sign a Public-Private
Partnership, or P-3, document to formalize the partnership."
President of Chemring Ordnance, Mike Quesenberry, said the company was
pleased to be the first industry to formalize a partnership with the warfare
center under the CITE arsenal designation, for a critical component of the
APOBS system.
"We look forward to expanding this partnership into
additional opportunities to jointly manufacture EDB propellant grains for other
weapon systems," he said. "Chemring Ordnance takes great pride in
providing quality products to the Warfighter and believes that this partnership
is a win-win for all."
Johnson also emphasized that workforce safety will always
remain the underlying priority for the command.
"Safety isn't negotiable; it is the most important
aspect of what we do," he said. "Our partner in Chemring understands
its importance, too, and we will never relinquish that as our
responsibility."
NSWC IHEODTD is a field activity of the Naval Sea Systems
Command and is part of the Department of the Navy's science and engineering
enterprise. The Division is the leader
in energetics, energetic materials, and Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD)
knowledge, tools, equipment. Our
Division focuses on the research, development, test, evaluation, in-service
support, and disposal of energetics and energetic systems as well as works to
provide Soldiers, Marines, Sailors, and Airmen worldwide with the information
and technological solutions they need to detect/locate, access, identify,
render safe, recover/exploit, and dispose of both conventional and
unconventional explosive threats.