Wright State University awarded Air Force funding for research at Calamityville

The Calamityville site, located near Wright State and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and boasting a large concrete structure, a maze of tunnels and other built-in props, is the perfect site for mass casualty exercises like this one from May 2011.

The U.S. Air Force has awarded a contract of $500,000 to the Wright State Research Institute and National Center for Medical Readiness for research at the Calamityville Tactical Laboratory site in training and rehearsal for medical and emergency response, disaster preparedness, search and rescue and humanitarian assistance.

The institute received the award under a technology collaboration program of the Air Force Research Laboratory’s 711th Human Performance Wing Human Effectiveness Directorate at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

The program, “Live, Virtual, and Constructive (LVC) Training, Rehearsal, and Exercise Infrastructure, Business Case, and Integration for Emergency Response” will assess Calamityville as a venue for high-fidelity research and training, rehearsal and exercise for a variety of military and civilian responders, as well as testing and experimentation of new technologies. Emergency response personnel include humanitarian assistance, emergency responders, disaster response coordinators, mobile medical teams and special operations and pararescue personnel.

 The Air Force is assessing live-virtual-constructive (LVC) environments for their effectiveness in training and conducting exercises for warfighters. This program will provide the 711th Human Performance Wing (HPW) a comprehensive plan for using Calamityville as a site for training and exercise activities, including supporting technology integration and tracking, monitoring, interaction, training, rehearsal and exercise activities.

“Wright State University, the Boonshoft School of Medicine and the National Center for Medical Readiness are excited about this most recent award from the Air Force Research Laboratory,” said Ryan Fendley, interim director of the National Center for Medical Readiness and director of the Wright State Research Institute. “This collaboration involving expertise from the university, a number of regional partners and AFRL will serve as the foundation for the development and implementation of live, virtual, constructive training platforms that can meet current and future needs of the Air Force and other federal, regional, state and local agencies.”

The Wright State Research Institute team brings domain knowledge, experience in assessing training needs, an innovative set of technologies for the LVC activities, and intimate knowledge of existing AFRL program activities. Calamityville already has technology integrated into the site that supports the Air Force research objectives, including a layered sensor system and high bandwidth and internet systems integrated with its Joint Command Operations Research Environment (J-CORE), a lab that enables integrated observation in controlled simulation.

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