Northrop lands mine-sensor deal

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The Naval Surface Warfare Center-Dahlgren Division has awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Corp. for a system that will help detect enemy landmines.

The $44.7 million award for the Coastal Battlefield Reconnaissance and Analysis (COBRA) system is the culmination of seven years of research into how the system could detect the mines, said Ken Davis, the COBRA system engineer.

The system, which could be deployed within five years, will enable soldiers to conduct operations without concerns about being hindered by land mines, he said. The system will give a commander additional flexibility to carry out missions with less risk to personnel, Davis said.

The system will use a multispectral or a hyperspectral imaging sensor system deployed in an unmanned aerial drone that would fly over an area. That sensor is designed to filter certain parts of the spectrum, similar to the way a filter on a camera lens works, thereby highlighting mines, Davis said. That data would be transmitted to a system that would overlay the sites of potential mines onto maps, enabling an operator to make a determination as to whether the objects could be mines.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center's Coastal Systems Station in Panama City, Fla., has been conducting an Advanced Technology Demonstration project since 1994 to determine if the sensors could highlight mines, he said. The contract award marks a significant milestone in moving the project toward deployment.

The most difficult task was creating a process to distinguish the mines from rocks and other such items, he said. The system also has to be able to work in a variety of environments, such as on a beach or in grassy areas.