ST Conference Preview
UDT 2012
Conference Speakers
The conference will open with a keynote address by Adm. Jaime Muñoz Delgado, head of the Naval Logistic Command in the Spanish Navy, followed by a panel discussion chaired by Vice Adm. Dr. José Manuel Sanjurjo, deputy director of institutional relations and industrial cooperation at Navantia (Madrid, Spain). The panel also includes Vice Adm. Cristián de la Maza Riquelme, director general of logistics for the Chilean Navy, and Vice Adm. Jean Louis Vichot, director of the Centres for Naval Studies for the French Navy.
Another speaker will be Dr. Thomas Curtin who, as program manager at the U.S. Navy Office of Naval Research in Washington, D.C., was responsible for the development of UUV technology in the United States.
Topics and Presentations
UDT 2012 will examine how innovation and engineering expertise can help meet the growing underwater threats. The agenda will cover maritime security, submarine warfare, anti-submarine warfare, mine warfare and mine countermeasures.
There are many examples around the world of technologies crossing industry borders, as is the case in the military and ocean exploration sectors. Dr. Antonio Sanchez Garcia from Sociedad Anonima de Electrónica Submarina (Cartagena, Spain) will present a paper on maritime security titled “SIDIS: A Global Marine Environment Surveillance & Protection System.” In recent years there has been a growing international interest in protecting the marine environment, particularly marine fauna, and the assets held within it. Yet the defense sector’s main concern is to protect vessels and critical infrastructures against possible attack from a variety of threats at unpredictable times. Recognition of this factor has led to a layered protection and surveillance concept. The system, known as SIDIS, employs units that are able to incorporate a high range of acoustic and nonacoustic sensors for use against hostile access in restricted marine areas, including a reaction capacity, measurement, environmental data recording and dissemination, marine conservation reserve protection, and marine fauna monitoring for study and preservation.
Although unmanned systems in other domains have experienced rapid growth resulting from wartime necessities, there remains a prevalent wait-and-see mind-set about unmanned undersea systems among those who work in and depend on the oceans. Dr. Rand LeBouvier from Bluefin Robotics Corp. (Quincy, Massachusetts) will present a paper that looks at the benefits for deploying multiple unmanned systems worldwide that connect via an overarching data network and provide persistent presence and access to information for a wide user audience.
Other conference presentations include “Advancements in Diver Communications,” by David Nicholls of Ranicar and Nicholls Consulting (Canberra, Australia); “SAKAMATA: Managing the Risk of Sonar Sound on Marine Mammals,” by Ton van Koersel of TNO (Delft, Netherlands); and “NURC Echo Repeater for Surface Ships and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles,” by Dr. Alain Maguer of NATO’s Undersea Research Centre.
More Information
For more information on UDT 2012, visit www.udt-global.com.
Exhibitors List
The following list of exhibitors was updated at press time:
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