WitnessMan: The Software Tool to Design, Analyse and Assess a Witness Pack with Respect to Military and Medical Effects on an (un)Protected (dis)Mounted Soldier

摘要

Witness packs are widely used to enable the characterization of fragments generated during ballistic experiments. To assess the effect of fragment impact on an exposed (dis)mounted soldier a follow-up Vulnerability/Lethality (V/L) simulation is essential. The overall process is elaborative and time consuming. This paper presents a 'proof of concept' of WitnessMan, an integrated software tool to support: * the design of the witness pack, including experimental conditions and restrictions, V/L assessment demands and financial aspects; * the in-the-field 'real-time' analysis of the exposed witness pack for a first characterisation of the fragment cloud; * the in-the-field 'real-time' human V/L assessment in terms of the military and medical effects on an exposed, (un)protected soldier. WitnessMan incorporates knowledge of many different fields of TNO research and enables the ability to adapt the witness pack configuration during the experiments to improve the fragment discrimination and thus improve the overall value of experimental research.