• Military Menu                       

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Industry
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• WMD
• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

NAVAIR's Hairy Buffalo Provides Network for Sea Strike

Story Number: NNS030207-18
2/7/2003

By Amy Behrman, Naval Air Systems Command Public Affairs, Network Centric Warfare

PATUXENT RIVER, Md. (NNS) -- The Hairy Buffalo, the Naval Air System Command's (NAVAIR's) Time Critical Targeting test bed, demonstrated the power of forward-based decision making during a recent Navy experiment in the Bahamas.

Sponsored by Naval Sea Command, Commander, Naval Submarine Forces, OPNAV N61F (FORCEnet requirements office) and NAVAIR's Network Centric Warfare (NCW) office, the Giant Shadow Limited Objective Experiment assessed emerging NCW tactics and technology requirements in the areas of networks, data fusion, command and control, situational awareness tools and platform/sensor architectures.

The "Giant Shadow" experiment was the first in a series of nuclear-powered guided-missile submarine (SSGN) transformational payloads and sensors experiments, as well as the first FORCEnet Limited Objective Experiment (LOE) under the Chief of Naval Operation's Sea Trial initiative.

"The Hairy Buffalo demonstrated significant capabilities in linking warfighters to enable a massing of effects rather than a massing of forces," said Cmdr. Ron Carvalho, Hairy Buffalo project manager.

According to Carvalho, the aircraft served as a persistent intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platform, conducting initial preparation of battlefield data and providing "eyes in the sky" for embarked Navy Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) team. "The Buffalo provided common communications interfaces that allowed ground, surface and undersea elements to operate together, seamlessly in sea strike operations," added Carvalho.

The Giant Shadow Experiment was designed to explore how a network of forces consisting of a stealthy platform (SSGN), Special Operations Forces, unmanned aerial and underwater vehicles (UAVs and UUVs), and sensors (underwater, overhead, and ground) could be used to clarify ambiguous intelligence.

Supporting objectives included demonstrating time-critical cueing and fusion of manned, unmanned and unattended sensor information; determining whether an orbiting UAV with a commercial off-the-shelf communications network repeater could reduce reliance on overburdened satellite channels; and testing how this network of forces might enable Special Operations Forces/SSGN to transition from reactive to preemptive operations.

Final results of Giant Shadow are currently being evaluated.

New capabilities and tactics developed via Hairy Buffalo experimentation will ultimately be transferred to the Navy's P-3 Aircraft Improvement Program, Maritime Strike Targeting and Multi-Mission Maritime Aircraft programs.

"The Giant Shadow experiment confirmed that Hairy Buffalo is a superb vehicle for demonstrating the art of the possible," said Capt. Alan Easterling, special programs director, NAVAIR Network Centric Warfare office. "Hairy Buffalo is an essential apparatus in the Navy's transformation laboratory."

Additional military units taking part in Giant Shadow included USS Florida (SSGN 728); elements of Naval Special Warfare Group 4; Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command 's USNS Mary Sears (T-AGS 65); and Naval Oceanographic Office's UUV, the "Sea Horse." The experiment was conducted at the Atlantic Undersea Test and Evaluation Center in the Bahamas.