Before the Shot
Written by Steve Goodman
It’s one thing to realize and accept that you need to always be on guard against the potential impact of a sniper’s bullet—it’s another entirely to actually be under fire—and not even know it. But that is the reality faced by soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan every day. The cacophony of noise and dust kicked up by a typical convoy in these areas makes it almost impossible to hear the crack of gunfire, or see where it might be coming from—until its already too late.
“Sniper fire is the second leading cause of casualties in Iraq,” said Mark Sherman, vice president general manager for Boomerang, BBN Technologies Corp. “It’s easy for people to hide out in buildings and just take random shots at U.S. troops and vehicles.”
Snipers have been haunting infantry like ghosts or phantoms through many wars, and their unnerving psychological effects on troops can be almost as lethal as their bullets. Their presence is being felt so much by warfighters in Afghanistan and Iraq, both physically and psychologically, that the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently called for the development of systems to detect, locate and neutralize snipers—in some cases even before they can fire a shot.
In 2004 troops in Iraq were under such pressure from AK-47 and other small arms sniper fire, that rather than issuing a broad agency announcement (BAA), DARPA turned directly to BBN Technologies, headquartered in Massachusetts, to develop and field one of the first such systems, known as Boomerang. Basically the system “can hear” incoming small arms fire. In 2005 Boomerang won both the DARPA “Significant Technical Achievement Award” and an MITX award, and is currently being used by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“As it turned out, back in 1995 BBN was the winner of a DARPA competition to be able to demonstrate the ability to detect sniper fire with acoustics,” said Sherman. “We proved back then in the mid-‘90s that you could localize a shooter’s location with acoustics.” Sherman goes on to explain that at the time there were not a lot of American troops being shot at, so the technology was put on the “back burner.”
That was until Operation Iraqi Freedom. “Early on in the Iraqi conflict,” he continues, “the insurgents were using AK-47s, not a very accurate weapon, to try to just sling rounds into moving, unarmored Humvees by firing ahead, around, behind them, etc. Our guys didn’t even know they were being fired upon until a windshield shattered, or they got back to camp and discovered their vehicles riddled with bullet holes.”
As a result of that, and the need to protect U.S. troops in unarmored vehicles from small arms, DARPA came back to BBN with a rapid reaction initiative. “They asked us if we could take that technology demonstrated back in the ‘90s off the shelf and turn it into an operational system that could be mounted on a vehicle moving at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour. The result was Boomerang.
Boomerang is described as a mobile acoustic shooter detection system (MASDS), and it was designed, tested and delivered by BBN within two months after being contacted by DARPA. Boomerang consists of a microphone array mounted on mast atop a vehicle that “listens” for the supersonic shockwave of a bullet. Once detected, it reports incoming fire and the relative shooter position to the crew within the vehicle on an LED screen—and with an oral alert—in less than a second. “It’s the fastest, most accurate system available,” said Sherman. “To date we have not had one report of a false alarm. There is a scientific reason for that; the system listens for the shock wave of the bullet. That shock wave has a distinctive signature. It’s not easily repeated in nature.”
Boomerang has proven to be just what DARPA was looking for when BBN was first contacted—a practical vehiclemounted sensor system that can identify the origination point of hostile small-arms fire in extreme weather conditions, when vehicles are static or moving through open fields or urban environments. But that didn’t stop BBN from making improvements on the system, and in 2008 the company was awarded a contract by the U.S. Army to deliver over 8,000 units of the latest generation of Boomerang. In a company press release, Lieutenant Colonel Terrence Howard, Army project manager, Robotics and Unmanned Sensors (PM RUS), stated, “Our soldiers are required to make split-second decisions, based on established rules of engagement, when confronted with hostile sniper fire. They deserve a capability that will tell them two things: was a shot fired and was it fired at me. We are excited about this opportunity to put a proven product in the hands of our deserving warfighters.”
While specific statistics are not available, sniper attacks since Boomerang has been deployed have unquestionably diminished. BBN’s Sherman describes one particular scenario. “We had a report of an ongoing sniper problem in an urban area, and our troops were unable to catch this sniper. We deployed a system quickly to the area in Iraq that was under fire. And in a few days this sniper struck again, only this time they were able to pinpoint the building the fire came from. He was captured fleeing the back of the building, and it turned out he was a Chechentrained sniper.”
A similar acoustical detection technology is employed by AAI’s projectile detection and cueing system, PDCue. PDCue is a gunshot detection system that can accurately and very quickly detect and cue locations of incoming small arms fire in both urban and rural engagement scenarios.
Like Boomerang, the system gives both an audio alert and visual display. It too can be mast mounted, and also has a functional low-profile display application. But there is a difference. “What is unique about PDCue is our ‘four corner’ approach,” explained AAI’s director of business development for advanced technologies, Derek Baker. “We use a four corner distributed array; most other systems use a single point array, where all of the listening sensors are clustered in one position on the vehicle, whereas ours are distributed about the four corners of the vehicle. What that allows us to do is alert the user not only to gunshots that are directed at the vehicle but to gunshots that are within the vicinity of the vehicle. For example, if you are in a convoy of vehicles and only vehicle one is equipped with PDCue, but vehicle four comes under fire, it will detect that and localize that fire too.”
PDCue can detect multiple shooters and burst gunfire, and the system has been designed to either stand alone or be networked and interfaced with other systems and subsystems. Baker explained, “From the beginning the PDCue Four Corner System was designed to interface with other systems. So we have ports that can accommodate Ethernet, Cambus 2—you name it—so that allows us to plug into cameras, remote weapons stations, other detecting sensors for a ‘Slew to Cue’ capability. For example, the PDCues being used by the Army are interfaced with a remote weapons system, so when the PDCue hears a gunshot, the operator can slew the gun on the weapons system directly to where that shot came from, in a matter of seconds. The length of time is determined only by the slew rate of the gun, because the PDCue is giving target info in milliseconds.”
ON THE GROUND AND IN THE AIR
The early and successful deployment of counter sniper technology was for the most part with large-scale vehicle-mounted acoustical detectors. The next logical step was to downscale the technology to wearable units that can be worn by individual warfighters. Such a device is SWATS (soldier-wearable acoustic targeting systems), part of QinetiQ North America’s Ears Gunshot Localization System product line.
In November 2008 the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF) inked a $9.95 million contract with QinetiQ for the delivery of SWATS. This was the Army’s first large-scale deployment of any soldier-wearable gunshot and sniper detection solution.
Wearable systems such as SWATS make information on the location of incoming sniper rounds available directly to soldiers so that they can effectively engage with return fire.
Major Shawn Aschan, assistant product manager for the counter sniper program in PEO Soldier’s Systems Integration Directorate, said, “Systems [such as SWATS] allow us to get the precision that we need, to key in on the actual sniper who is attacking us.”
Currently there are about 1,000 individual gunshot detection systems in use in Iraq and Afghanistan.
BBN’s Sherman explains that they too are working on a wearable version of Boomerang.
“We are working on a new product called Boomerang Warrior that is a soldier-mounted gunshot detection system. We are delivering operational units to the Army in April to undergo testing prior to a full operational deployment this summer.”
AAI’s Baker reveals that they are considering migrating PDCue to a man-wearable system, but no such system is yet available.
PEO Soldier hopes that by next year individual gunshot detection systems will be established as a regular acquisition program.
Acoustical detector arrays have proved themselves in combat— but they are not the only technology involved in gunfire detection. For example, Radiance Technologies WeaponWatch uses infrared to detect the signature flash of muzzle fire. According to the company, WeaponWatch uses infrared sensor fidelity and super high-speed data analysis to enable warfighters to instantaneously detect, locate and classify firings of a broad range of weapons. Accessing a database WeaponWatch almost instantaneously identifies not only the location, but the type of weapon fired, based on its unique heat, signature, allowing the soldier to react, often by returning fire, even before the “crack” of the gunshot is heard.
Such infrared or other “muzzle flash” detection devices may be faster than acoustical detectors since they are based on light rather than sonic signatures—but according to BBN’s Sherman, visual detection may be more prone to false reports than acoustic technology, which has proved to be 100 percent accurate in the field. However, manufacturers and the military agree that no one detection system is “one size fits all,” and suggest that using systems in conjunction can and does provide the warfighter with more complete protection.
The Army’s counter sniper effort is led by Program Executive Office (PEO). PEO Soldier has been instrumental in the deployment of vehicle-mounted and individual gunshot detection systems. But their multipronged approach to sniper detection also includes equipping troops with handheld thermal imagers, stabilized and ruggedized binoculars, and even such “low-tech” but effective modalities as camouflage nets for soldiers in the turrets of armored vehicles to conceal themselves from sniper fire.
Nor is sniper detection limited to boots on the ground. Several technologies incorporate the use of unmanned aircraft or UAVs. The Air Force’s 820th Security Forces Group (SFG) at Moody Air Force Base, Ga., recently conducted a test of a Boeing ScanEagle being used in conjunction with a ShotSpotter gunfire detection system. The ShotSpotter, an acoustical system, was not mounted on the UAV, but information about the location of a sniper from ground or vehicle-based arrays is transmitted to the UAV, which can then engage the target with TV cameras, or in theory, weapons. In a company press release issued at the time of the initiation of the test, Air Force Colonel John R. Decknick, commander, 820th Security Forces Group, said, “GSAT/ScanEagle has the potential to increase our combat capability, protect the lives of our airmen, and provide incredible situational awareness to our deployed security forces commanders.”
Currently, both BBN and AAI are talking about developing Boomerang and PDCue platforms for use in helicopters, other manned and unmanned aircraft, and marine vehicles. Both systems are also in place protecting fixed locations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
NEXT GENERATION
Sniper fire counter measures have proved to save lives and protect troops. “The results of the entire counter sniper program are telling. The sniper attacks have decreased over in theater,” Aschan said. “Our shot-detection systems are effective both in deterring snipers and in responding to them.”
And yet sniper fire is still a significant cause of casualties in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Experience has shown that the diverse terrains of Iraq and Afghanistan create vastly different kinds of threats from small arms fire. In the urban battleground that is Iraq, sniper fire tends to come from insurgents concealed in and around buildings, whereas in Afghanistan the threat is from snipers who are scattered among rugged mountainous terrain and rocky outcroppings.
The goal of the next generation of sniper detection will be the creation of a fully integrated sniper protection system, such as was called for in DARPA’s C-Sniper program (BAA07-37)—that will provide warfighters with the capability of “detection and neutralization of enemy snipers before they can engage with U.S. forces”—at all times, in all environments. ♦