Low Cost Swimmer Detection

Added: March 29, 2007 The Office of Naval Research (ONR) is soliciting white papers and full proposals describing innovative technology concepts to provide Low Cost Swimmer Detection and Identification. Concepts are required that will detect and initially classify a swimmer or diver who has entered a specific zone around an asset to be protected. The environment of interest is primarily expeditionary, focusing on the waters surrounding and approaches to individual Navy ships that are temporarily berthed at ports and anchorages in world wide locations. The targets include free swimmers, open and closed circuit divers, and divers aided by Diver Propulsion Vehicles (DPVs). Concepts may range from short range sensor technologies suitable for barriers to longer range active systems, but should be novel or clearly competitive in terms of the size, weight, and cost considerations that may be associated with future organic or expeditionary concepts of operation for swimmer detection. The effort will include basic concept investigations and experiments leading to the development of hardware for a demonstration of the concepts in a realistic environment. The intention is to initiate new research efforts in FY 2008 with candidate concepts demonstrated in FY 2010 or earlier.