US Army Puts Dummies To Work To Improve Combat Safety
Dummies have experienced a lot over the years, from going through windshields, to being set ablaze. Now, IED explosions can be added to the resume.
Gizmag reports the U.S. Army has awarded a contract to California-based Diversified Technical Systems to work on the branch’s Warrior Injury Assessment Manikin project under the U.S. Army Research Development and Engineering Command. The WIAMan project’s mission will be to assess how soldiers handle explosions caused by IEDs, land mines et al while inside a vehicle, with the goal of improving safety on the battlefield.
To do this, military casualty data from operations in Afghanistan and Iraq is combined with biomedical sensors meant to simulate the human body when attached to a dummy. The dummy is then subjected to the same sort of underbody explosions and blast waves soldiers hope not to experience on the field, which is then recorded to equally small data boxes, each holding up to 16 GB of data.
Seattle-based writer, blogger, and photographer for many a publication. Born in Louisville. Raised in Kansas. Where I lay my head is home.
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How much more data do they need? They've had actual Soldiers getting blown up for over a decade now. And yes, we had plenty of dummies in my unit, but there we could always find a job for them on the FOB so they didn't really see much combat which I suppose kept us all safer.
I'm surprised that the right hasn't suggested conscription of the lower class as a more fiscally prudent alternative.