"SEA ARCHER" Distributed Aviation Platform

Abstract

Currently, no system exists that provides a sea-based distributed aviation platform capability. The emergence of Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) / Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles (UCAVs), the continued U.S. Navy focus on the littorals, the desire for force distribution, the need for operational cost reductions, and the advent of Network Centric Warfare (NCW) all continue to support the requirement to re-evaluate how littoral operations will be conducted in the future. Given this background, a bottom-up design of a ship supporting a primarily UAV/UCAV air wing in a low to medium threat environment is of significant interest. SEA ARCHER meets this interest. This report outlines a design that meets the future needs for distributed aviation with a high-speed, highly automated platform. Large gains in reduced manning through automated systems for both operation and damage control helpmeet the demanding needs for the future of the Navy at reduced operational costs. The report will outline both the Mission Needs Statement (MNS) and Operational Requirements Document (ORD) for the ship that was developed. The analysis of alternatives that was conducted to determine relative size requirements for the ship in presented in the next section. The concept design that resulted as a result of the Total Ship Systems Engineeing process in then presented. Finally, a detailed look at the analysis and trade studies that were conducted in presented in order to show the more detailed analysis that was conducted in designing the ship.