May 22, 2013 -- By Dolly Rairigh Glass, Team Orlando Public Relations
Marine Corps Systems Command’s Program Manager Training Systems is working with the Army to develop a system of manned modules and workstations that allow tank units to train armor collective tasks at the platoon through battalion task force level.
The Army’s project manager for Combined Arms Tactical Trainers, Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation provided the M1A1-D Close Combat Tactical Trainer variants to the Marine Corps as government-furnished equipment, said Annette Pike, product manager for Collective Training Systems within PMTRASYS.
The Marine Corps is incorporating the Marine-unique characteristics, the Firepower Enhancement Package, into the CCTT training systems to replicate the individual crew stations of the Marine Corps Main Battle Tank, she said.
“The Marine Corps is using their competitively awarded contract, called CCTT Concurrency Contract, for the Marine-specific development and fielding of CCTT, and their Warfighter Focus contract for sustainment of the training systems, once fielded, throughout their lifecycle,” Pike said.
Fielding is planned for March 2014 for 14 M1A1 modules to the 2nd Tank Battalion at Camp Lejeune, N.C. These M1A1 FEP CCTT modules consist of seven mobile trailers containing 14 M1A1 FEP modules, three Mobile Operation Center trailers, one Mobile Theater After-Action Review Trailer and three Portable Power System Trailers.
“While CCTT is not considered a comparable replacement to conducting unit deployment for training exercises, the CCTT will overcome the lack of maneuver space aboard Camp Lejeune,” Pike said. “By providing a virtual training environment, it gives 2nd Tank Battalion the ability to conduct training tasks it otherwise would not be able to conduct.”
Currently, 2nd Tank Battalion can only train to 42 percent of the 6000- and 7000-level standards associated with the battalion’s evaluation coded training tasks. The CCTT will help fill this identified training gap.
PM TRASYS is leveraging PM CATT’s CCTT software baseline, which will allow the two parties to collaborate in the future. This will ultimately increase the capabilities for both services and at the same time reduce lifecycle costs and save taxpayer money.
“In a true IPT fashion, PM TRASYS and PM CATT are working together,” said Colonel Michael Coolican, Program Manager Training Systems. “The Marine Corps has a Marine Infantry captain managing from the PM TRASYS side, along with a chief engineer and project engineer bringing the Marine technical requirements to the table.
“We are also using subject matter experts from Camp Lejeune for the critical review meetings to ensure the Marine capability is matching the weapons platform,” Coolican said. “Likewise, PM CATT is using their CCTT team to support the Marine Corps in delivering this needed capability to the fleet. This is truly a successful partnership between PM CATT and PM TRASYS.”
PM TRASYS and PEO STRI are not strangers to collaborating and working together. A memorandum of agreement was signed May 22, 2012, to officially recognize the two organizations’ working partnership.
The MOA outlined the goals, objectives and responsibilities between PM TRASYS and PM CATT in their efforts toward increasing partnership through synergistic capability development. The primary focus of the MOA is to drive down development, procurement and sustainment costs for similar Army and Marine Corps training requirements.
One year prior to that, in 2011, PM TRASYS also signed an MOU with PM TRADE to document their commitment to maintaining a partnership to work together on similar Individual and soldier and Marine training devices.
“These partnerships also help improve technology developments by industry because when the requirements are combined and presented to industry, it is much more powerful,” Pike said. “With the Marines and the Army working more closely together on common training requirements, specifically to approaches to collective and virtual training systems, the industry partners can better leverage their internal resources.”
No matter who is working with whom, whether it’s PM TRASYS, PEO STRI, Naval Air Warfare Center Training Division or Air Force Agency for Modeling and Simulation, the partnerships are strong, according to Coolican. “These organizations’ efforts, along with the resources and support of industry, academia and government organizations, make up Team Orlando. Together they are working to accomplish their single goal of improving human performance through simulation. “